This year, from 14 to 24 June, Serbia for the first time took part in the Prague Quadriennale as an independent country. The producers of this important project, Yustat and BELEF Centre managed to raise the performance of our country at this most important exhibition in the world dedicated to set design, to a considerably higher level than the one dedicated by "our countries" to the Prague performances to date. The highest recognition for our efforts came from Heiner Goebbels, one of the most important theatre authors of today, who started his presentation before the capacity audience at the lecture hall of the Prague Quadriennale by praising the exhibition of Serbia as the only significant layout at the Quadriennale, in his opinion, "the layout which, unlike the others, demonstrates its creativity through interaction of the audience with the art work." Also, two students of the Faculty of Applied Arts of Belgrade University of Arts, Ana Milić and Snežana Veljković, won the UNESCO Award for their works at the competition that looked for answers to the theme of Aristophanes’ "Birds". This is the first time that someone from Serbia, in any category, wins an award at the Prague Quadriennale.

The national curator of Serbia, Dr. Radivoje Dinulović, set the topic of the presentation at the Prague Quadriennale through a triad character of relations THEATRE – POLITICS – CITY. It means that the object of observation is simultaneously every individual phenomenon, their mutual relations, as well as the entity they are building. It is clear that the political changes, often disastrous and always dramatic, that shook the geographic and spiritual space of Serbia and former Yugoslavia were a direct cause for addressing this topic and that major street events (in 1991, 1996-97 and 2000) were culmination in the process of "theatralization of the city" and "urbanization of the spectacle" that today surround and define us.

As the field of investigation, i.e. the physical framework for the case study, was selected Belgrade, which has become a synonym for the public political scene of 1990s, and not in our region only. We regard the year of 2000 and the events of the 5th of October as the beginning of a new era and new spirit (regardless of the extent to which everyday events relativize this statement) and we consciously reject the conclusion.

At the Quadriennale 2007 was not presented what used to be the habit up to now, a selection of works realized in the professional production. Instead, the National Layout consisted of original space structure of expressed visual and semantic value, which is the author’s reply to the theme of Quadriennale and the topic of performance of Serbia. The author of the National Layout is Branko Pavić, a painter and a graphic designer, full professor at the Faculty of Architecture of Belgrade University (associates in the project – Nenad Katić and Olivera Gračanin).

The executive producer of the performance of Serbia at the Prague Quadriennale was Aleksandar Brkić, marketing and PR manager was Jelena Knežević, technical director was Darko Nikolić. The project was realized with the support by the Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Serbia, Secretariat for Culture of the City of Belgrade, Assembly of the Municipality Stari grad (Old Town), "Svetlost teatra" (Theatre Light), "Logotext", Institute for Urbanism of the City of Subotica, Telecom Serbia, Public Enterprise "Public Lightening" and MPC Properties.

In view of the successful performance of our country at the XI Prague Quadriennale, an exhibition will be organized in the scope of BELEF 07; the Belgraders will have the opportunity to see it from 27 June to 12 August 2007.

Branka Pavić "Magic Cube"
Prague Quadriennale 2007, Installation, Print, Sound,
3,80x3,80x3,80м, 2007.
Collaborators: Nenad Katić and Olivera Gravanin
Ilistrations: Nenad Katić