The Turned Out Pocket: A Skyscraper For Birds – Vladimir Perić Talent

The event is part of the Rijeka 2020 programme →

A new building in a residential district. Superb design, elegant and functional apartments. Close to the sea. All birds are welcome, regardless of species and marital status.

As an antithesis to prominent Rijeka structures – the Vulkan skyscraper, the empty glass shell of the Tower Center and the chimney in the Vulkan settlement, Belgrade multimedia artist Vladimir Perić Talent will construct an 11-metre tall wood and metal sculpture containing 160 “apartments” for birds.

The construction of a skyscraper for birds, which reflects the type of construction that many of Rijeka’s residents live in, takes place within the “Yoga in everyday life” Cultural Centre complex and the Dharma Hostel. It uses materials from local artisans who, after the factory collapsed, settled in the Vulkan settlement area. Self-sustainability is also reflected in the selected micro-location – birds and bees that left the area in large numbers during the active work of the factory are now returning once again because of the persistent work to maintain green spaces around the Dharma complex. The spontaneous migration of birds will take place outside of the written and unwritten laws and conditions of hospitality, and time, as one of Perić’s favourite materials, will play an important role in the metamorphosis of the sculpture.

Building a skyscraper for birds is the idea of a young architect who finds an old, unused bird house in the attic of a family home. Not seeing the purpose of such an unusual particularity, he adjusts the outdated concept to a contemporary context, in which humanism, empathy or appreciation of individuality are not overly significant concepts. The narratives that shape people’s housing systems, driven by profit or the fact that it is important to place as many people as possible in as small a space as possible, regardless of the adequacy of such housing and the quality of life, are not foreign to young architect. So he comes up with the ingenious idea of building a skyscraper for birds, hoping that this will become a global situation for bird housing as well, and that all the credit, both through fame and through money, will go to him.
Vladimir Perić Talent

Organiser: Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art
Flagship: Times of Power
Partner: Dharma Hostel and Yoga in Daily Life Cultural Hall