Momir Korunović

Momir Korunović (Serbian Cyrillic: Момир Коруновић), was a Serbian architect associated with Serbo-Byzantine Revival.^[1] He was sometimes called the 'Serbian Gaudi'.^[2][3][4] Although he designed many buildings in Belgrade and Yugoslavia between the two World Wars, he is largely forgotten today. Many of his works were destroyed or substantially altered during World War II and the communist period.^[5]

Momir Korunović
Born	(1883-04-17)April 17, 1883 Jagodina, Kingdom of Serbia
Died	April 17, 1969(1969-04-17) (aged 86) Belgrade, SFRJ
Education	Czech Technical University in Prague
Occupation	Architect

Biography

Early life and education

Momir Korunović was born on April 17, 1883, in Jagodina, Serbia. He was raised in the village of Glogovac, where his father Prota Petar Korunović served as a priest.^[6][7]

Korunović finished his higher education in Belgrade and undertook postgraduate studies at Czech Technical University in Prague,^[8] funded by a scholarship from the Ministry of Education of Serbia. During his studies, he created a distinctive style that he continued to develop throughout his career.^[7]

Military service

Korunović served in the First Balkan War and received the Gold Medal for bravery for his professional merits and courage. His experience during the war later influenced Korunović to take an authentic Serbian point of view in architecture.^[7] He also served in the military during the First World War and retreated through Albania with the Royal Serbian Army. During the war, he continued to make sketches and designs for subsequent projects.

Architecture

In addition to working in the civil service as a government official^[9] in the Ministry of Construction, Korunović was also a prominent member of the Pan-Slavic organization Sokol. He was the head of the Belgrade Sokol Society "Matica" and was responsible for construction of about thirty Sokol movement buildings in Serbia.^[8][3] In 1926, he was the youngest member of the commission for the construction of the Church of Saint Sava. He participated in the "Salon of Architecture" exhibition in 1929. Among the many architects of that era, mostly architects of modernism, he was a representative of traditional architecture and romanticism.

During the occupation of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia, he continued to work in the ministry. He retired in 1942. After the war, he spent his retirement days in his house in Vračar, where he mostly wrote his memories and illustrated earlier publications.

He died on April 17, 1969, in Belgrade. He was buried in the village of Bogava.^[10]

Projects

Korunović build the Belgrade city center for physical culture "Stari DIF", located on Deligradska street in Savski Venac municipality. The project was built for the needs of the Sokol Society "Matica" between 1929 and 1936.^[11] He also designed a stadium ("Sokol stadium") for the 1930 Sokol manifestation in Belgrade. The stadium was located on the site of today's Faculty of Mechanical Engineering.^[8] In 1934 he constructed Sokol Building in Jajce, wehre the second conference of AVNOJ was held and later the Museum of the National Struggle for Liberation was established. The stadium accommodated around 40,000 spectators. It had arched entrances, four for the audience and three for athletes. On the north side, there was a music pavilion in the form of an arched tribune, with towers in the background, decorated with the symbols of the All-Slavic Sokol movement. On the south side was the royal lodge. For this project, he was awarded the Order of Saint Sava.^[12] The Seismological Institute Building and the Post-Telegraph-Telephone Museum are also the work of Momir Korunović as well as many churches, monuments (for example, Zebrnjak and Memorial Ossuary, Mačkov kamen) and other prominent buildings, with total of 143 authored projects.^[13]

In 1922 Korunović was entrusted with the task of renovating the marshal's office of the Yugoslavian Royal Palace so it would be suitable for guests coming to Belgrade for the royal wedding of King Alexander I Karađorđević and Princess Maria of Romania. The semicircular wings were kept for accommodations while the rest of the building was assigned to the Marshal of the Court. The building was demolished in 1953, as it blocked the view of the Parliament.^[14] The old Post Office has also been altered beyond recognition.^[15] The new, communist authorities, considered its façade "too bourgeois" so they removed the remains of the façade and reconstructed only the skeletal architecture under it, which suited the more simplified style which was pushed by the government in the immediate post-war period.^[16]

Selected works

• 
  Sokol building in Belgrade
• 
  Sokol building in Obrenovac
• 
  Sts. Cyril and Methodius Church (Ljubljana)^[17]
• 
  Church of the Cover of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Belgrade
• 
  Church of Holy Ascension, Krupanj
• 
  Seismological Institute Building^[18]
• 
  Korunović's family house^[19]
• 
  Old Post Office^[20]
• 
  Unrealized project, 1912–1914
• 
  Unrealized project of a Post office building, 1912-1914^[18]

See also

• List of Serbian architects
• Milan Antonović
• Dragutin Dragiša Milutinović