Dubravka Sekulić: " 'Glotzt nicht so romantisch!' - on extralegal space in Belgrade"

Glotzt Nicht so Romantisch! On Extralegal Space in Belgrade delves into the political and legal origins of extra-territory, through which the housing policy of socialist Yugoslavia can be traced, during the 1990s, with property turning from "ours" into "mine", and the 2000s, when the attitude of transgressing urban regulations became the norm, which explains much of the vast extra-legal urban interventions that shape the city today. Dubravka Sekulić started her research with the enigmatic extensions of the so-called Russian Pavilions and continued to scrutinise the extra-territory between the illegal and the legal they belong to. Not only are the pavilions not Russian, but, more importantly, the act of their extension in the 2000s followed particularly shady negotiations between inhabitants, developers and municipal authorities, which placed the extensions beyond simple (il)legality.

Dubravka Sekulić is an architect focusing on the topics of transformation of public domain in the contemporary cities, commons and spatial justice, and spatial implications of neoliberal planning. Her book Glotzt nicht so Romantisch! on informal roof extensions in Belgrade and their relation to the law was published in 2012, by Jan van Eyck Academie. Together with Žiga Testen and Gal Kirn she co-edited the book Surfing the Black about Yugoslav black wave cinema published by Jan van Eyck in Spring 2012. In 2012, together with Andrej Dolinka and Katarina Krstić she curated a show Three points of support: Zoran Bojović at Museum of Contemporary Arts in Belgrade, with the focus on the African and Middle Eastern projects of Bojović and their relation to the Non-Aligned Movement. She is continuing to explore the relations between Yugoslav construction companies and Non-aligned Movement as a PhD researcher at the Institute for History and Theory of Architecture of ETH in Zurich.

The event is hosted by KTH Arkitekturskolan in collaboration with Filippa Stålhane