THE CALVERT JOURNAL

14/12/21 | How Belgrade's Ratko Mladić mural is using the past to shape the future
A new mural of convicted war criminal Ratko Mladić has sparked both outrage and approval in Belgrade. But as Aleks Eror explains, the veneration of historical, wartime figures through modern-day art is no new phenomenon in the former Yugoslavia — and in most cases is firmly focused on the future, rather than retelling the past.

04/8/20 | Why a Belgrade art gallery is exhibiting the diaries of Yugoslav war criminal Ratko Mladić
In 2017, Bosnian Serb former commander Ratko Mladić was sentenced to life imprisonment over war crimes and genocide committed during the 1990s. Currently on display in Belgrade, Mladić’s war time diaries should provide crucial insight into the mind of one of the major perpetrators of the Bosnian bloodshed. Instead, artist Vladimir Miladinovic’s archive intervention reveals the banality that often underpins tyrannical behaviour.

28/2/20 | Despite it's name, Belgrade's Museum of Yugoslavia is looking towards the future
The institution serves as Tito’s mausoleum, and yet the programme at The Museum of Yugoslavia goes beyond the need to preserve recent history by involving artists and taking on contemporary topics such as migration.

15/1/19 | Balkan and botoxed: one playwright holds up a mirror to Serbian beauty ideals and the result isn’t pretty
From oversized prosthetic bums and bosoms to perfectly polished nails, the costumes in Staša Bajac’s all-women production are just one of the ways the Serbian playwright unpacks the dark side of male desire.

21/10/19 | Boogie: the photographer who captured Belgrade's underbelly amid Serbia's trouble '90s
Boogie began shooting Belgrade amid the Yugoslav wars, turning his lens on the everyday violence in a city plagued by neglect.

04/6/19 | What’s behind the recent craze for Yugoslavia’s modern architecture?
An essay on the enduring fascination of Yugoslav modernism.

06/9/17 | Dizelaš: the ‘Serbian gopnik’ style that defined the ‘90s is making a comeback
A feature on the tracksuit-and-trainers ‘dizelaš’ look that proliferated on the streets of 1990s era Belgrade against a backdrop of war and gangsterism.

28/4/17 | Battle for Belgrade: why activists are pushing back against Serbia's loss of cultural space
A feature on Belgrade's sham privatisations that are decimating Yugoslav-era cultural institutions.

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14/3/17 | Belgrade is Not the New Berlin: What’s Stopping Serbia’s Capital From Rising to the Top?
A response to the many travel features that cast Serbia’s capital Belgrade as "the new Berlin".