Visiting the stunning Brutalist memorial at the site of the Jasenovac concentration camp again today was a really welcome reminder of silence and sacredness and symbolism. I don’t know that I can imagine a higher calling for art than what Bogdan Bogdanovic fashioned in a quiet meadow along the River Sava which is the border between Croatia and Bosnia. Our students get a lot out of touring this memorial and learning about the tragic history that it represents.
I really liked these quotes I found on various information kiosks, so I wrote them down.
“The melancholic restressed concrete lotus not only stops evil thoughts on each end but it also has a cathartic power. It insults no one. It threatens no one. It does not encourage revenge yet it does not his the truth.” (Excerpt from a poem by the architect)
“It is difficult in any time of ideology to understand that there are people who do not belong to ideologies, who do not take sides, who carry their peace so deep inside that at one point it has to scream out in the form of art and beauty—like the one Bogdanovic created with his Flower. Why is Bogdanovic’s Flower of Jasenovac so memorable and miraculous? Because the very art is a dualism of the compatible and the incompatible, the cursed and holy, the beautiful and horrendous...and I believe, that with its metaphysical characteristics it leads a harmonious and peaceful dialogue with the victims of Jasenovac. After all, to them it belongs.”
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