Hintergrund 45

Description

The exhibition “Balkanology” curated by Kai Vöckler as well as the Architecture Congress illustrated the little-known building achievements of the era of post-socialism and offered a fascinating overview by means of research projects, urbanistic interventions, architectural analyses and planning strategies on the topic of “New Architecture and Urban Phenomena in Southeast Europe”. Why the Balkans? – “Because the Balkans is the most exciting region in Europe. (…) Because the collapse of communism and the subsequent wild urbanization caused by an unrestrained early capitalism, the countries of Southeastern Europe also present themselves as the laboratory of a new and hungry architecture,” states Dietmar Steiner and rightly refers to the decades of ignorance of the “Western European-North American media hegemony” towards the architectural achievements of Southeastern Europe. After almost exclusively tourist consumption, the cultural depth of this region is largely undiscovered, with a spectrum of characteristics that can only be inadequately grasped by the term “Balkanology” anyway