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MUSEUM OF CONTEMPORARY ART

WHERE IS IT?

The location of the Museum of Contemporary Art was chosen in New Belgrade, i.e. confluence of the Sava and the Danube, opposite the Belgrade Fortress.

THE HISTORY

The Museum of Contemporary Art in Belgrade was opened on October 20, 1965, although the Museum's activity began in 1958, when the decision was made by the Council for Culture of the People's Committee of the City of Belgrade to establish the Modern Gallery - an institution whose task was to monitor the development of Yugoslav contemporary art art. The Executive Council of the SR of Serbia decides to build a building for the needs of the Modern Gallery that would satisfy modern museological principles.

Miodrag B. Protić, a painter and author of important exhibitions, books and texts in the field of the history of Yugoslav and Serbian modern art, was appointed as the first manager of the new Museum.

The museum began its work in the attic of the building at 5 Obilićeva venac, where the establishment of the institution and the acquisition of works of art began. The largest number of works were in private collections, so a period of buying these works began throughout the former Yugoslavia.

The site for the museum was chosen on the banks of the Sava River in 1960, when the island was built according to the project of architects Ivan Antić and Ivanka Raspopović. At the same time, the Gallery of the Museum of Contemporary Art was designed in the building in Pariska 14. That building was designed by arch. Mirko Jovanović, and the Gallery soon began its work.

THE DESIGN

The building of the Museum of Contemporary Art represents one of the most significant achievements of post-war Yugoslav architecture and the most significant example of museum buildings in the territory of the former Yugoslavia. The museum building was designed by Ivan Antić and Ivanka Raspopović in 1965. It ranks among the interesting examples of museum architecture in the world. The Museum building was declared a "cultural asset" in 1987 and is subject to appropriate protection by the Institute for the Protection of Cultural Monuments of the City of Belgrade.

The external form consists of six intersecting two-story cubes with an even roof line. The cubes are rotated in relation to the rectangular ground floor at an angle of 45 degrees. The external appearance of the Museum resembles crystal shapes. The building is surrounded by a park where there are works by the most important Yugoslav sculptors of the 20th century.

Olga Jančić, Maternity II, Museum of Contemporary Art Park, 1957.

 

INTERIOR

The interior walls are lined with white marble slabs, and the sloping roof surfaces are covered with glass, which enables adequate daytime lighting of the exhibition space. The unique and at the same time complex interior space, without vertical partitions and corridors, is divided into five exhibition levels connected by stairs. Those levels seamlessly transition into one another, so it is possible to observe the exhibits on the lower levels from the higher levels. In this way, visitors are also able to easily move through the entire space of the museum.

 Erwin Wurm's One Minute Forever exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Art, 2022.

The value of the Museum of Contemporary Art in Belgrade lies in the fact that it is the first purpose-built museum building in Belgrade. The authors were awarded the October Award of the City of Belgrade for Architecture in 1965 for the museum project. Also, Ivan Antić is the winner of the Seventh of July Lifetime Achievement Award in 1969 and the SAS Grand Architecture Award in 1984. This work earned the author membership in SANA in 1976.

Written  by Maja Milović i Sofija Jovanović