Town Hall Meeting:
Day Two
19 October 2026
19:00 h
TOPOGRAPHIES OF CHANGE
Landscape and Spatial Interventions That Have Reshaped Cities in Bosnia and Herzegovina (2016–2026) Curator: Ajla Čavkić Green Design Biennale, Mostar
The post-war recovery of cities in Bosnia and Herzegovina is most often viewed through the architecture of buildings: their reconstruction, the construction of new residential and commercial developments, and the restoration of infrastructure. Alongside these efforts, a key yet often overlooked process has unfolded in landscape architecture and public space. Parks, promenades, squares, riverbanks, and memorial landscapes have become spaces where the social, political, and cultural transformation of the post-conflict city has been most clearly reflected.
The exhibition “Topographies of Change” explores landscape and urban interventions carried out from 2016 to the present that have had a visible impact on everyday life, identity, and perceptions of cities in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
Its focus is on so-called “soft” spatial transformations rather than monumental architectural gestures – interventions in open spaces that have often driven social renewal, restored the public character of urban space, and brought a sense of normality back to the city.
The exhibition extends beyond completed projects to include critical reflections, research initiatives, student projects and graduation theses, as well as unrealised proposals that have examined urban space in Bosnia and Herzegovina from distinctive, critical, and forward-looking perspectives. These works are read as “topographies of potential” – a parallel history of the city as it might have been, and a valuable archive of ideas, methods, and approaches that can inspire future transformations of public space.
In this context, landscape is understood as an active urban layer: as infrastructure for social life, as a space of memory and trauma, and as a potential foundation for new forms of togetherness and everyday engagement with the city.