A Peripheral Moment

Experiments in Architectural Agency: Croatia 1990-2010

Ivan Rupnik

A comprehensive account of the recent architectural scene in Croatia, this book is an account of the highly productive decade of architectural experimentation in Croatia lodged between the violent break-up of Yugoslavia and their slow integration into the EU. Ivan Rupnik guides the reader through the emergence of this bizarre and fascinating architectural scene on the very edge of united Europe, utilizing Ljubo Karaman’s theory of the periphery as a distinct space of artistic production from that of the center or province, Manfredo Tafuri’s concept of architectural experimentation, as well contemporary notions of agency. The account is framed using a variety of different lenses, including the observations of this moment by renowned writers, through the atmosphere of the period as defined by Croatia’s complex post-socialist/postwar identity and the subsequent positioning of the architectural profession vis-a-vis that context, the practices that emerged, and through a series of discussions with some of the peripheral moment’s primary agent provocateurs: 3LHD, njiric , Randic – Turato, and STUDIO UP.