Lecture and discussion on memorial architecture
Speaker: Ena Kukić
part of the international conference “Memory, Affects and Emotions”, Session VI: Materiality of Memory
Organizers and scientific committee:
Prof. Dr. Wojciech Owczarski (University of Gdańsk, Poland)
Dr Polina Golovátina-Mora (Universidad Pontificia Bolivariana, Colombia)
10-11 June 2020
Gdańsk, Poland + Online via ZOOM
Within the international conference “Memory, Affects and Emotions”, Session VI: Materiality of Memory, our university assistant Ena Kukić presented her state of research on memorial typology under the title “Spatial framework of collective memory”. This is part of her ongoing doctoral research on memorial architecture at the Institute for Design and Building Typology under the supervision of Andreas Lechner.
From the abstract:
(…)
These focal points of collective memory are the intersections at which the history of a nation should reveal itself – but instead, what is revealed are the political aspirations of official state structures. Although memorial architecture does not represent all spaces of collective memory, which can be manifested in other typologies and larger scales (such as entire cities), it is nevertheless a deliberate, targeted embodiment of official commemoration and a good litmus test for questioning the prevailing narrative. In addition to the approach to creating or shaping new places of memory, the treatment of existing ones also indicates the ways in which we subjectify and appropriate the past. Identifying and contextualizing these phenomena are of particular importance in societies with conflicted or fragmented collective memory.
