Ars Adriatica, No. 5, 2015.
Original scientific paper
Fourteen Architectural and Planning Visions of the Historic Centre of Zadar after 1953
Antonija Mlikota
; Department of Art History, University of Zadar, Croatia
Abstract
The article describes the situation in Zadar after the Second World War as one of the worst damaged towns in Yugoslavia, which was the main reason for the creation of the first post-war urban planning initiative and for the involvement of the Yugoslav Academy of Sciences and Arts, with Miroslav Krleža at the helm, in the rebuilding of Zadar. A number of factors hindered the renovation of the historic centre of Zadar. The slow progress and inefficiency were caused by its reputation as an ‘Italian’ town, the exodus of the pre-war urban population and the influx of a large number of people from the rural and the islands as well as the fact that Zadar remained officially Italian until 1947 and the overall political and social situation. The earliest planning proposal for the rebuilding of Zadar was made in the Ministry of Buildings of the People’s Government of Croatia: the proposal in 1945 and the final plan in 1946. The architects of the new plan were Milovan Kovačević, Božidar Rašica and Zdenko Strižić. The plan was rejected in 1948 and therefore not applied. Since Zadar did not receive the status of a liberated zone, it had no access to the special federal grants for rebuilding and so, having no urban plan in place, it was left to deteriorate. Also in 1948, Miroslav Krleža, a well-known Croatian writer, politician and the then deputy president of the Yugoslav Academy of Sciences and Arts, visited Zadar. Having seen how serious the situation was, Krleža decided to have the buildings of the nunnery of St Mary renovated and used by the Institute of Historic Research of the Yugoslav Academy of Sciences and Arts. Although the project was not carried out, it drew attention to the restoration of Zadar and encouraged the Academy to begin producing a draft plan for the entire urban area of Zadar as a foundation for the Invitation to Tender Bids for the Regulatory Planning Basis for Zadar in order to direct the development of the town to the areas outside the historic centre in an organized way. Due to a lack of funds and a lack of support for the experts working in the field, in May 1952, it was decided to advertise the call for bids without a general draft plan and, sadly, without a regulatory framework for the wider urban area. The Invitation to Tender Bids for the Regulatory Basis of Urban Planning in Zadar Peninsula and Architectural Proposals for the Historic Centre was advertised and stipulated that all the bids be submitted anonymously. The jury received fourteen designs, each with a unique code, three of which were selected as prize winners, further three were recommended for purchase, and two designs were rejected. This paper presents all fourteen designs and explains what happened with the urban plan that was created by architect Bruno Milić, one of the three prize winners, after the end of the process in 1955. This is the first time in more than sixty years that all of the fourteen designs are presented together; after the tender was closed they were displayed at the subsequent exhibitions in Zadar and Zagreb in 1954. The article also analyzes the jury’s assessment of the proposals such as their perceived positive and negative aspects mentioned in the reports and the reasons why two proposals were rejected. It also examines the jury’s decision not to award the first prize because, in their opinion, none of the architects fulfilled the specification criteria in full. The proposals present interesting architectural and urban visions of the historic centre of Zadar from 1953.
Keywords
Zadar; 1953 tender; historic centre; twentieth century; architecture; protection of monuments; Miroslav Krleža
Hrčak ID:
149682
URI
Publication date:
18.12.2015.
Visits: 3.650 *