The Concrete Rupture: An Examination of Yugoslav Islamic Heritage in the Aftermath of the 1963 Skopje Earthquake

Abstract

The study of the Cold War built environment and its links with communist ideology have permeated the field of architectural history and theory since the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989. However, the treatment of Ottoman Islamic heritage under state socialist rule remains a little examined subject. The earthquake that demolished large swaths of the Yugoslav city of Skopje in 1963 caused heavy damage to Ottoman architecture. In the years that followed, the reconstruction of Skopje became a symbol of a singular, international collaboration between countries from both sides of the Cold War divide. The city that arose became the 1970s brutalist capital of the Balkans. This article examines the treatment of Ottoman urban heritage in Skopje and its sociocultural and political implications during the post-disaster (re)construction of a modernizing and modernist city. I argue that disregard for the historical breadth and the continuing religious, cultural, and social significance of the region’s Ottoman-era urban spaces and structures for Skopje’s Muslim community in the creation of the brutalist city was not exclusively based on anti-Muslim rhetoric. Rather, it was part of the driving quest for modernity sought by the Yugoslav communist leaders in the second half of the twentieth century.