The presentation of the project “Imagining the Balkans: History, Memory and Dialogue in the South-East Europe” was held today at 12h in the Ministry of Culture, in the framework of the December programme of the National Commission for UNESCO. The speakers were Isidora Kovačević and Aleksandar Berkuljan.
The presentation aimed at acquainting the general public with the international exhibition “Imagining the Balkans: Tradition and Modernity in the Second Part of the 19th Century” which is a shared project of the national history museums from the entire region. Namely, the exhibition will be dedicated to the formation and the development of modern nations in South-East Europe, emphasizing cultural and other processes which had brought about the transformation of traditional societies into modern ones.
Organized under the protection of UNESCO and ICOM, the exhibition will be open during Slovenia’s Presidency over the Council of Ministers of Culture of South-East Europe on April 8th-9th 2013. Beside Slovenia and Montenegro, the countries participating in this manifestation are: Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Macedonia, Bulgaria, Romania, Albania, Greece, Cyprus and Germany. Each country has the obligation to host the exhibition, and it has been scheduled for display in Montenegro from May to September 2014.
It has been pointed out during the presentation that despite the fact that the relations in the Balkans have been characterized by conflict, the different forms of communication on every level have led to an intersection of traditions which created a historical necessity. For this reason, it is particularly important to work on the establishing of dialogue between nations, thus respecting the shared heritage incorporated in the identities of the peoples of the Balkans.
