9/7/2023
The Government of the Republic of Slovenia has declared 2023 the Year of Edvard Ravnikar, dedicated to researching, presenting and raising awareness of the architect Edvard Ravnikar, whose heritage is of great importance to Nova Gorica.
His urban planning solution for the construction of Nova Gorica began to be implemented in 1947, and although he was only involved in the planning of the city in the early years, he nevertheless marked it with the fundamental features and character of a modernist city. This is why this year the Municipality of Nova Gorica has dedicated a number of projects to this great man, and we will also pay tribute to him in the European Capital of Culture programme.
One of these projects within the framework of GO! 2025 is the Shining Invisible City, led by the MoTA Cultural Association – Museum of Transitory Art. It will focus on the city as it could have been if Ravnikar’s original design had not been altered by the tectonic political and ideological shifts after the Second World War. The project will give visibility and tangibility to this unrealised Nova Gorica – the mapping of the invisible Nova Gorica will be carried out through an exhibition and an in situ intervention, which will map the shadow city that so much defines life in the real city, at least partially in space.
The modernist city is also the focus of Ab initio, dedicated to researching the history of Nova Gorica, run by the Magistrala institute. The main aim of the project is to preserve and promote the tangible and intangible heritage of the city and to co-create it together with the local community, as well as to analyse and present other new (modernist) cities that emerged ab initio, from scratch, in twentieth-century Europe.
