Contemporary memorial projects and their predecessors

Text: Flóra Perényi

Born in Bosnia-Herzegovina, Sabina Tanovic is an architect graduating from the Sarajevo University, who started research into the theoretical background of the correlations of memory and architecture apropos of a professional invitation; in 2007 she was commissioned with the designs of the memorial site of the attack on Sarajevo. As a result of this project, first a doctoral thesis and then a book was punlished within a decade, and the author has evolved into an emblematic expert on the architecture of memorial sites by now. In 2015 the doctoral thesis of Tanovic titled Memory in Architecture: Contemporary memorial projects and their predecessors was assessed and accepted by TU Delft university. The theoretical background of this focussed on issues like why the architecture of memorial sites is relevant for survivors, especially in the case of collective traumas? What is the role of the architect and the space created by him or her after such complex and often tragic historic events, and how has the concept and expression of memory changed in architecture in the past centuries?