Bogdan Bogdanović

Bogdanović was also known for his essays on urbanism and architecture, and was active in Yugoslav Communist Party politics, serving as Mayor of Belgrade from 1982 to 1986. He was dismayed by the rise of nationalism in Yugoslavia, and went into self-imposed exile in 1993, dying in Vienna in 2010.

Bogdan Bogdanović studied at University of Belgrade Faculty of Architecture. The recorded working language is Serbian, German and Croatian. The field of work recorded is architecture and philosophy. Employment is recorded with University of Belgrade Faculty of Architecture. Positions recorded include Mayor of Belgrade. Distinctions recorded are Herder Prize, Decoration of Honour in Gold for Services to the State of Vienna and Austrian Decoration for Science and Art First Class.

• Name — Bogdan Bogdanović • Born — 20 August 1922 • Birthplace — Belgrade, Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes • Died — 18 June 2010 • Place of death — Vienna, Austria • Education — University of Belgrade • Significant Buildings — * Jasenovac monument • Partisan cemetery in Mostar • Awards — Herder Prize (1997)

Bogdanović was born into a family of leftist intellectuals. His father Milan Bogdanović was a literary critic, long-time president of the Association of Writers and director of the National Theatre. Beginning in 1940, Bogdan studied architecture at the University of Belgrade. He participated in World War II ("a bit" in his words) as a partisan, becoming a member of the Communist Party, and was seriously wounded in eastern Bosnia. Despite his injuries, he continued his academic career after the war, graduating in 1950, becoming a teaching assistant at the department for urbanism (from 1953), then a docent in 1960, extraordinary professor and president of the Yugoslav Union of Architects in 1964, dean of the Faculty of Architecture and a corresponding member of the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts (SANU) in 1970, and full professor in 1973. In 1981 he resigned from SANU, and he was conferred emeritus status in 1987. Being an ardent leftist, Bogdanović opposed the increasing nationalism espoused by state leaders since the early 1980s. Nonetheless, he became Mayor of Belgrade in 1982 on the initiative of Ivan Stambolić, then chairman of the League of Communists of Serbia. Bogdanović served one term in office, until 1986. During this time, he organised an international competition for the complete redevelopment of New Belgrade, a planned area on the left bank of the Sava river. All submissions to this competition have since disappeared. After his term of office, he was appointed by Slobodan Milošević as a member of the Central Committee of the League of Communists of Yugoslavia, the party's supreme governing body. He accepted the post under the condition that he would not be required to attend committee meetings because he "had more important things to do". In the following year he sent Milošević an anti-nationalist letter over 60 pages long, including a Stalino-dictionary, an appendix satirising the recipient's nationalist rhetoric, and the famous Lamentation for Serbia, which discussed the theme of Serbia "being tired" (of its leaders). The Central Committee replied, "You can send the letter, in which you criticise the work of the eighth meeting and which has not reached us, to the Central Committee if you consider it necessary". The letter, in combination with other remarks about Milošević, led to attempts of breaking into Bogdanović's apartment, death threats, and his exclusion from the Central Committee. This, however, did not prevent him from renewing his anti-nationalist statements when the Yugoslav wars started at the beginning of the 1990s, once more turning Bogdanović into a target for violent attacks and a defamation campaign run by the Serbian state media. In 1993, Bogdanović went into self-imposed exile to Paris with his wife Ksenija. However, since the Yugoslav émigré circle there had strong nationalistic tendencies, the couple moved on to settle in Vienna upon invitation of his friend, the writer and translator Milo Dor. Bogdanović died in a hospital in Vienna on 18 June 2010, following a heart attack. He was cremated in Vienna, and his urn was sent to Belgrade. Although the city offered a grave for him in the Alley of the Greats at the Belgrade New Cemetery, upon his wife's request, and the approval of the Jewish community, Bogdanović's remains have been placed in the Sephardic cemetery where his monument to the Jewish victims of fascism and fallen soldiers stands.

The architectonic and literary work of Bogdanović is characterised by an abundance of ornaments. It is influenced by Romanticism and Victorian architecture, surrealism, metaphysics, Jewish symbolism and Kabbalah. Bogdanović has opposed the architectural theories of Adolf Loos developed in the essay Ornament and Crime, and argued for the "semantic dignity of the ornamental sign".

Bogdanović refused to participate in the planning of national housing estates which looked like "coffins of concrete" to him and had "only two types of windows". Consequently, he built only a single settlement: a housing estate for the hydrotechnical institute "Jaroslav Černi" at the foot of the mountain Avala near Belgrade, finished in 1953. The houses are mostly built of stone; and with their surrealistic, old-fashioned style, heavily framed windows and oversized chimneys, they are deliberately set apart from the international style that dominated in post-WW2 Yugoslavia. Other settlements were planned in great detail, but never really intended to be built. Among those is a town in northern Montenegro, designed for local clients, and a mythological "town at the bottom of the lake (Biograd)" which Bogdanović designed for his own pleasure.

Other works of architecture include the reconstruction of the villa of Queen Natalija (Smederevo, 1961), Adonis' altar (Labin, 1974) and the Tomb of Dušan Petrović-Šane (Aranđelovac, 1980).

Bogdan Bogdanović worked in architecture and philosophy. He was employed by University of Belgrade Faculty of Architecture. Recorded position is Mayor of Belgrade. He belonged to Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts and Bavarian Academy of Fine Arts.

Bogdanović was a founder member of the International Academy of Architecture which was established in 1987 and a foreign member of the Russian Academy of Architecture (from 1994), a corresponding member of the Bavarian Academy of Fine Arts (from 1998), and a member of the Collegium Europaeum Jenense (University of Jena; from 2000). In 2002 he was elected an honorary member of the Academy of Sciences and Arts of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Awards and prizes include: • October Prize of the City of Belgrade (for the memorial in Sremska Mitrovica, 1961) • Gold Medal of the City of Belgrade (October 1966) • Menção honrosa ("honorable mention" at the São Paulo Art Biennial, 1973) • Seventh of July Prize (1979) • Anti-Fascist Council of National Liberation of Yugoslavia Prize (1981) • International Piranesi Award (1989) • Herder Prize (1997) • Austrian Cross of Honour for Science and Art, 1st class (2002) • Gold Medal for Meritorious Service to the Province of Vienna (2003) • International Carlo Scarpa Prize for Gardens (for Jasenovac Memorial Site, 2007)