The Birds on the Way of Progress

The Birds on the Way of Progress (BDA_CS0102)

To make a utopia even possible it is necessary to find a ”perfect place”, a forgotten place, bared, petrified, on the brim of existence, in the process of destruction, where some confused, poor, abandoned people live, wistfully waiting for some big changes. A world suitable for false promises, deceits, imposed ideals. Perfection of false values. Unreality, thereby no past, no present and no future. Nowhere. Overjoyed mass from the beginning transforms into impersonal, blind, frightened, helpless people, totally under the control of its great leader, elevating himself to the dimension of God. A utopia of one man becomes a dystopia of others. Slogans drop, standstill, repetrification. Space: Old mill backyard,Belgrade Old mill is the oldest steam mill on the Balkans built in 1904. After the Second World War it was seized by the communists from its original owners and turned into a warehouse of the grain industry. In 1994 it burnt in a fire. Since then it is the object of municipal derision and subject of machinations and conflicts between different politicians of the Milosevic regime, current city authorities, old owners and some new investors. The tall stack is protected as Belgrade's cultural monument. Part of my inspiration for this play had been the propaganda posters for big social movements during the history of mankind on which the main motive were usually the workers, as largest part of the population, and their factory stack as a symbol of some progress and a better future. So, with its past and present history, the old mill is also esthetically a perfect place for the realization of my concept for The Birds.



Ivana Nikolic, Dragana Ladjevac, Serbia
Faculty of Applied Arts