If the president turns Hall 1 into an Opera House, he will have to build a new building inside it that will cost the same as the building in New Belgrade, where the location for the Belgrade Opera House was determined fifteen years ago, a former city architect tells Vreme.
"Vučić's announcement of the Opera House in Hall 1 of the Belgrade Fair is pure marketing," Đorđe Bobić, a former city architect, told Vreme.
"At one point, there was an extremely heated negative public reaction to the news about the demolition of the Belgrade Fair complex, and the president, in order to calm the public, said: we will demolish the Fair, but not Hall 1, we will turn it into an Opera House!" It has nothing to do with the profession nor is it based on any professional examination, it was said only to silence the public at that moment!"
Đorđe Bobić says that the fair's Hall 1 represents "an outstanding exhibition space at the world level, which it has proven for decades." Making her something else is a mistake. Of course, everything is a matter of engineering and architecture, and in that sense everything is possible, but turning it into an opera implies a complete change of the physiognomy of Hall 1."
"The existing facility is not for opera, it has neither acoustic nor other conditions that a stage performance implies." If the president wants the opera to be right there, he will have to build a new building within the existing hall that will have all the necessary conditions."
He assesses that "in a professional sense, it would be an inadequate move. The cost of that construction would be adequate to the cost of building a new building, where it was said fifteen years ago that it would be."
Đorđe Bobić reminds that the location for the Opera building already exists "in New Belgrade, between the Museum of Contemporary Art and the Palace of Serbia, where the Museum of the Revolution was once planned", and that the competition for the building was international, that an excellent solution was obtained "but everything was given up".
In recent years, that space has been talked about as the site of the new building of the Belgrade Philharmonic. "In the beginning, it was said that it would be a joint building for both the Opera and the Philharmonic, which makes sense because those two activities involve the same parameters and Serbia is not so rich that it can build separate buildings." And then suddenly the Opera was removed from that place."
Professional associations and organizations did not comment on the president's idea to move the Opera to the fair hall, only the voice of certain experts was heard.
Đorđe Bobić says that the passivity of the "Urban Planning Institute, the Institute for the Protection of Cultural Monuments, the Association of Architects of Belgrade and the Association of Architects of Serbia is common, because they are all government services." Just as they were silent about Belgrade on the water, the gondola on Kalemegdan, Makiško polje, they are also silent about the Fair."
"Only those people who are not connected to the system speak, everyone else is blackmailed." I can speak freely because I am retired, what can they do to me, take away my pension? But my colleagues who are in institutions cannot, although when we meet privately, they say the same thing as me."
Bobić says that "dialogue has been abolished, the possibility for you to say what you think, so that someone opposes you, and for you to come to the best solution together, by opposing opinions, has been abolished."
"The consequences of that are severe. Once upon a time, during Broz's time, not a single building was built without a public competition and public discussion. Then the profession wondered. Because, you know, what is built once cannot be repaired. You will never be able to fix Belgrade on the water again, it will forever remain as it is. And that's why one person must not decide about it, stand in front of the cameras and say - this is where the Opera will be, so enjoy!"
And President Vučić, presenting the "Leap into the Future" project, announced as many as three opera scenes in Hall 1 of the Belgrade Fair, which "not that they will not collapse as the opposition says, but will become the epicenter of culture." He revealed that it will have three opera stages (1.500, 450 and 200 seats), which would make it "a home not only for opera, but also for ballet and theater groups and orchestras."
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