Meta-memorial

Abstract

This contribution focuses on the World War II memorial site in Sarajevo – the Vraca Memorial Park (Spomen-park Vraca), Bosnia and Herzegovina. The memorial site inadvertently memorializes other difficult histories and is layered with material and immaterial remnants of the past that speak of both perpetratorship and resistance to forces of terror. Officially inaugurated in the 1980s – a last decade of the existence of Yugoslavia, the site is emotionally charged and renders palimpsests of history clearly readable. In this, the site invites critical reflection on contemporary collective and individual remembrance in public space at sites of difficult heritage. This chapter explores the potential of conceptual design proposals and art practices that call for the restauration of significance and reactivation of the site as both an attractive public space and a space of remembrance to problematize and reexamine the very concept of “Vraca” as a memorial site and how it fits into the contemporary Bosnian and Herzegovinian culture of remembrance and co-remembrance. It sheds light on an underexplored heritage site whose importance lies in both its architectural qualities (Vraca was designed as a unique interdisciplinary architectural, sculptural, and landscape memorial site), as well as in its sociopolitical and symbolic properties (e.g. the memorial site was built by citizens of Sarajevo and after a decade, the site became a podium for terrorizing citizens during the Siege of Sarajevo). Also, the contribution will propose a design conceptual approach that complicates common strategies applied in official attempts geared toward the reactivations of difficult heritage sites.