Piran Days of Architecture 40, Edvard Ravnikar and Boris Podrecca

If last year we wrote about some anniversaries, this year there are at least two that are important for the Slovenian space, namely the 30th anniversary of the death of the architect Edvard Ravnikar, the main protagonist of Slovenian architecture in the second half of the 20th century, and the 40th anniversary of the birth of the Piran Days of Architecture. Both anniversaries were also marked in the magazine, as the latter is the reason why Piranesi itself was created back in 1992.

The Piran Days of Architecture are held every November in Piran, or Portorož, where they actually started in 1983. At that time, on the initiative of architects involved in the circle of architect Vojteh Ravnikar, an exhibition of the Kras Group was organized and a conference was held, which eventually grew into a traditional autumn meeting of architects in Piran. Meetings that have been a window to the world for architects and students since the first beginnings of the opening of the then Yugoslavia to the then European world of architecture. Let us not forget that these were the years of socialism, of what Western Europe called the leaden years behind the Iron Curtain, even though on our side we saw this curtain differently, as one of the most open borders in Europe. Well, at least the socialist authorities of the time liked to boast about it and to emphasize the openness of the Yugoslav-Italian border. We, still students at that time, did not agree with this, because we missed foreign countries, information, and meetings, and the three days of the Piran Days of Architecture gave us at least a partial opportunity to experience all this. We were able to see European, world-class architects up close, listen to their lectures, socialize with them and thus personally get in touch with their personalities and their architecture. Perhaps this is one of the greatest contributions of the Piran Days of Architecture conference: opening up to the world and networking.

Over time, the Piran Days grew, the annual lectures were upgraded with an exhibition of works by architects from Central Europe, and further reflection followed when the first prize, named Piranesi, was created and awarded. This went to Bogdan Bogdanović in 1989 for his phenomenal body of work commemorating the events of World War II on Yugoslav territory. The first award was followed by others, and in 1992, on the initiative of Vojteh Ravnikar and Tomaž Brate, as well as Ranko Novak and others involved in the editorial board, the first issue of Piranesi was published, whose primary mission is to highlight the culture of space and its Central European orientation. Of course the magazine always publishes the award-winning works from the Piran conference, alongside other quality contemporary productions and the presentation of icons of modern architecture, mostly from the 20th century. Since its inception, Piranesi has become a companion and record-keeper of Piran Days of Architecture, and we hope that this collaboration will continue for many years to come. And that the Piran Days will continue to be that superlative meeting of architects, where the main focus will be on connecting and exchanging different views in a personal, direct human way, i.e. socially, by socializing.

In Slovenia, we like to talk about the so-called holy trinity of the pioneers of our architecture, among whom Jože Plečnik stands out, followed by Maks Fabiani and Ivan Vurnik. The first half of the 20th century in particular was a period when Slovenian architecture was being built. In the second half of the 20th century, immediately after World War II, younger architects, including Edvard Ravnikar, Edo Mihevc and even younger ones, came and laid the new foundations of the Ljubljana School of Architecture and set new directions for the field in Slovenia. But it is Edvard Ravnikar, in particular, who can be said to have been a pivotal figure in several fields. There is virtually no major architecture from this period that does not bear his personal stamp. From Trg Republike – with Cankarjev dom as the most important urban-architectural complex of contemporary modernist Ljubljana – to the projects that co-created the new image of Kranj. Some of his works have already been presented in Piranesi, such as the memorial complex for the victims of war on Rab (Piranesi No. 4/1994), the Ferentov vrt in Ljubljana (Piranesi No. 30/2014) and this year it is fitting to present his first project in Ljubljana, the building of the Moderna galerija. Andrej Hrausky describes in detail the situation and the unique opportunity that presented itself to the young architect, at that time still without any major references, to design a prestigious gallery of modern Slovenian art. From the first conceptual sketches, approved by Izidor Cankar, to the start of construction in the early 1940s and the opening of the first exhibitions in the still unfinished building immediately after the end of the war. It is an interesting read, which tells us that, in addition to immense talent, many other things are needed to achieve project realization.

In the interview we focus on the work of the architect Boris Podrecca, who can undoubtedly be said to be the most renowned living Slovenian architect, or at least the most renowned living architect who also has Slovenian roots. He calls himself a European architect who works all over Europe and the world. Born in Belgrade in 1940, he lived in multicultural Trieste after World War II, and after studying in Vienna made himself one of the best-known names in Slovenian, Austrian and European architecture. In this interview, we can find out more about his Slovenian connections, his latest works in Ljubljana, but also in what ways he is connected with Piran, the Piran Days of Architecture and what his beloved city of Vienna – where he has lived and worked since the 1960s – means to him. One of his landmark contributions to the Slovenian nation is the “discovery” of the architect Jože Plečnik. Already in 1967, while still a student in Vienna, he organized an exhibition on Plečnik. In it, he revealed the quality of Plečnik’s architecture, which at that time, at least in Slovenia, was ignored, silenced, if not banned. With the second Plečnik exhibition, in 1986 at the Centre Pompidou in Paris, he (together with François Burkhart, Lojze Gostiša and Damjan Prelovšek) conceived an exhibition that actually launched Plečnik among the stars of world architecture. We should also mention two of his smaller projects in Ljubljana, both interior designs from the 1980s that still defy the ravages of time, the Platana Bar and Bistro and the Dessa Gallery, the latter of which was listed in order to preserve it as he designed it.

The theoretical section of the magazine is complemented this time by two contributions, the first of which offers an overview of Slovenian architecture in the period 1970-1990 through the eyes of the Italian architect Raimondo Mercandante. In the second, our regular contributor Vladimir Šlapeta highlights letters from the German architect Hans Scharun to the Czech architect Lubomir Šlapeta. Archival material that also shows the importance of direct, personal connections.

The contemporary architectural production is enormous, there are also many excellent projects from the countries of Central Europe, and it is difficult to highlight most of them in the limited space of the magazine. However, one of them was awarded the Piranesi Award at last year’s Piran Days, the renovation of the monastery church in Žiče Charterhouse, designed by Medprostor. The jury said that it was awarding the international Piranesi Award to this project for its courageous and sensitive approach to the renovation of cultural heritage. The authors of the project have recreated the silhouette of the roof with the innovative element of a movable roof, which creates a new function and reinterprets the previous ruins.

Slovenian projects include the renovation of a former glassworks in Ptuj into a modern cultural centre in the old medieval town, the renovation of the former Rog bicycle factory into a workshop-laboratory cultural centre in the centre of Ljubljana, and the architect Tina Rugelj, a Slovenian designer who, among other things, designs urban furniture made of curved Eternit concrete panels.

In short, this issue of the magazine, still in a printed format, once again offers some interesting reading, from theory and history to the work of contemporary architecture and design offices.