Hotels
Photographs from Hotels series depict Yugoslav hotel interiors, representatives of the local 1960s socialist modern design. Empty and deserted, with a lingering atmosphere of past times, these spaces have become spectacles of anachronism. Photographs reflect on the atmosphere of the “golden age” of Yugoslav socialism, the psychology of the times, and how it is shaped in constructed spaces. Small exhibitions of the photographs of the hotel interiors were staged and exhibited in selective hotel rooms, being on view only to the hotel guests.
“Mixing deadpan observation and richly speculative imagination, Vesna Pavlovic photographs the interiors of the once-grandiose hotels that were built during Yugoslavia’s “golden age” in the 1960s and ‘70s. Like many of her artistic contemporaries, Pavlovic is less interested in analyzing the formal aspects of architecture than in evoking the collective psychology that shapes constructed spaces. With an ironic precision, she registers the colors and patterns of carpets, the textures of wall coverings, the fabrics that adorn curtained windows, the design of decorative objects, and the arrangement of room furnishings. Together, these details evoke the complex aspirations – sometimes laudable, sometimes laughable – that characterized a particular era of East European socialism.” Christopher Phillips, Fusebox, 2002
