mањеж

manjež (mањеж) park is situated in the heart of belgradestreets

…edged by nemanjina, resavska, kralja milan and svetozara markovića, all themselves fascinating.

according to wikipedia mањеж “derives its name from the French word manege (riding school) from the Royal Horse Guards housed at the site until 1931. The current park was built in 1931-33, according to the General Ordinance Plan of 1923. The designer was Aleksandar Krstić, a pioneer of modern landscape architecture. The park is one of the few green areas within the city, built between the World wars in the classical style. With two diagonal pathways, the park also functions as a significant corridor of pedestrian traffic. The park has an area of 26,457 sq m and a total of 253 trees of varying vitality. It accommodates several important sculptures, both commemorative and decorative”

the sculptures of mањеж are the real feature of this post…the background notes below are from wikipedia, with thanks…

…first an intriguing sculpture, simply marked lusan popović, maybe someone will help me with more background to this eerie piece?

…another striking sculpture about which i know nothing…

“Radovan Dragović was born on 10 December 1878, in Uzice and died on 7 January 1906, in Belgrade. He was prominent in the Serbian labor movement, and a cofounder of the Serbian Social Democratic Party. A carpenter by profession, h organized the publication of the socialist newspaper Napred in 1900 and was on the editorial board of the socialist newspapers Radnicki list and Start radnički list and other publications. His articles called for a struggle to create working-class organizations in Serbia. He was the editor of the newspaper Radnički novine, the organ of the Serbian Social Democrats, from 1902 to 1905, and from 1902 to 1903 he was the secretary of the so-called Central Committee of the Workers’ Organizations, which was the forerunner of the Serbian Social Democratic Party. When the party was founded in 1903, Dragovic became its secretary and subsequently its chairman. He fought for the ideological, political, and organizational unity of the working class of Serbia.”

“Kosta Abrašević was born in Ohrid, on 29 May, 1879, to a merchant family. His father was Serb and his mother was Greek. After finishing three years in a Greek school at Ohrid, he continued his schooling in the Šabac gymnazium, where he started using his fathers nickname “Abraš” as a surname. Early on he came in to contact with Socialist ideas, and established a political-writer group in Šabac, which released the magazines “Omirov venac” and “Grbonja”. In his poetry, socialist and social ideas are prevalent. He translated German Socialist poets, like Hans Lever, Obenhald and others. His original poems are found in working- and socialistical magazines after his death, and his collection, which had been released many times, was printed by high-schooled group in 1903. His works are translated into Russian, Hungarian, Albanian and Romanian, also some of his works are interpreted by composers such as S. Anđelić and M. Živković. He died in Šabac on January 20, 1898, only 19 years old.”

“When Serbia and Poland signed the cultural cooperation between Serbian Ministry of Culture and Polish Ministry of Culture and National Heritage in 2010, a statue of Frédéric Chopin, the Polish-French composer and pianist, was unveiled to mark the 200th anniversary of his birth, marked across the world this year”

…Franz Liszt needs little introduction…

“Josif Marinkovic born on 11 Octobe,r 1851 and died 13 May, 1931 was one of the most important Serbian composers of the nineteenth century.”

and of course, no post about belgradestreets would be complete without graffiti…

and i was captivated by this line of empty benches…try finding a space here in summer to reflect, read….