Poster for the first roundtable of the Eastern European and Balkan Architecture Thematic Group in Bucharest, June 2006
Photograph: Carmen Popescu

A view of the exhibition Two German Architectures at its Brussels venue (Musées Royaux d’Art et d’Histoire / Musée du Cinquantenaire, January – Februrary 2007), where it was shown on the occasion of the German EU Presidency. The visitors are participants in the European parliament inter-group “Urban Logement.”
Photograph: Courtesy of the Bauministerium des Landes Niedersachsen / Simone Hain

Participants at the conference and workshop of the Eastern European and Balkan Architecture Thematic Group in Bucharest, May 2008.
Photograph: Carmen Popescu

EAHN Thematic Groups: Eastern European and Balkan Architecture

The idea of thematic groups within the European Architectural History Network was formulated already in January 2006 at the EAHN’s first annual business meeting in Berlin. These groups aim to address specific topics of international interest within the broad scope of the network as a whole. This finer organizational articulation can reflect a variety of criteria, such as architectural typology, historic epochs, or geographical frameworks. To date, three thematic groups exist within the EAHN: Judicial Architecture, Colonial Architecture, and Eastern European and Balkan Architecture. The latter is introduced here as the first in an occasional series reporting on these groups and their activities. Members interested in joining the thematic groups may contact the EAHN secretariat for further information: office@eahn.org.

The thematic group on eastern European and Balkan architecture was the first to be established within the EAHN. Several dozen scholars have attended its events, with over thirty actively involved in group projects; the group has no chronological limitations, although it features a clear emphasis on the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.

Although geography represented an important factor in creating the group, it was, however, not the most significant one: in this case, geographical framing constituted a manner of addressing a region which is rarely if ever treated by the general discourse of architectural history. Hence, besides connecting scholars from eastern Europe and the Balkans, or those working on the region, the group aims also to contribute to a shift in current historiography. This approach means to provide a platform for its participants both in terms of a tribune – making a place for a voice which has been scarcely audible in the general discourse of the discipline– and of enhancing visibility for the work of the scholars studying the area. The two labels defining the group – eastern Europe and Balkans – are strong indicators of its historiographic positioning: while the first reminds one of the
political division which ruled our world until recently (and which perhaps lingers in cultural discourses), the second recalls the recurrent effects of geopolitics.

This historiographic emphasis is nuanced and enriched by other significant criteria, such as architectural themes and typologies specific to the region. These varied concerns provide a clear focus for the group, without imposing rigid constraints on it.On the contrary, the group seeks to open the dialogue, in order to (re)introduce eastern European and Balkan topics to a larger audience. The transnational approach is further strengthened by interdisciplinarity: all the events developed until now have gathered not only art and architectural historians, but also historians, anthropologists, and scholars from other related disciplines.

The group debuted with the roundtable “A Disenchanted Brave New World. Looking Today at the Architecture of the Former Communist Bloc” at the National University of Architecture in Bucharest, on 2 June 2006. Taking advantage of the travelling exhibition Two German Architectures 1949-1989, co-curated by Hartmut Frank and Simone Hain (on view at the National Museum of Contemporary Art in Bucharest, May-June 2006), the event examined the problematic fortune of the architecture of the former Soviet bloc in the post-socialist perspective, in terms of both theoretical studies and preservation issues. The Romanian scholars and their
guest, Simone Hain, debated these topics and also discussed the possibility of developing collective projects—such as a study of architecture for the masses during the Cold War—which could unite the countries from both former blocs as they question major architectural, social and political issues of the postwar period.

Another roundtable, organized at the Institut National d’Histoire de l’Art (INHA) in Paris, May 2007, analyzed aspects of the historiography of eastern European art and architectural history. Entitled “The ‘Other Europe,’ Changing Visions in Art History,” the roundtable aimed to explore the place occupied by eastern European art and architecture in both the writing and teaching of art history.* The debates stimulated the preparation of a special issue of the journal Ligeia (forthcoming in 2009).

Parallel to the networking involved in and generated by these two meetings, a more focused configuration was developed, devoted specifically to the study of the Balkan region. This group responds to a real need of scholars from inside and outside the geographical area to share their knowledge on Balkan topics, disregarding language barriers (a serious issue for scholars hoping to gain a global view of the region), and also to develop common research strategies and prepare common projects. If the Balkans already constitute a defined field of studies for historians and cultural historians, there is no such approach yet for art and architectural history.Moreover, the group aims to connect its research with current Western scholarship by studying transfers and circulation of forms and ideas between the major artistic centers in western Europe and those in the Balkans.

In May 2008, New Europe College - Institute for Advanced Study in Bucharest hosted a conference and a workshop, “Building Modernity in the Balkan Peninsula.” The event, related to the program Europa (www.nec.ro) intended to demonstrate the relevance of Balkan topics in constructing a coherent discourse on architectural history in general, but also to create a platform for interested scholars. While the conference presented the state of the research, the workshop debated core issues for creating a platform, such as thematic and chronological frames, methodology, transdisciplinarity, but also financial policies. As a result, a Balkan working group was founded, formed of scholars from most of the countries in the peninsula and from different Western countries. Gathering more than thirty members, most of them architectural historians, the group is currently preparing a common program and working on several projects, such as the Balkan city and its models in western and central Europe.

Carmen Popescu