Concetration Camp Inmate Cemetry on the Island of Rab

architect Edvard Ravnikar
project Concetration Camp Inmate Cemetry, Rab, Croatia
written by Tomaž Krušec

 

The design for the concentration camp inmate cemetery in Kampor Bay, island of Rab, was made by Edvard Ravnikar in 1953. The memorial complex was built in honour of the victims of the Italian concentration camp in operation on the island of Rab in 1942 and 1943. The project and the construction were carried out during the post-war period of the establishment of the new state, a time of recollection It was erected in memory of the victims of the Second World War. During the post-war period the most often used symbol of the fight against the occupiers was a monument.  Most of these realized were figurative sculptures that dominated the space where they were placed. Thus they expressed remembrance for the dead in the most direct way. Ravnikar’s placing memorial buildings in an urban and rural environment departed from the stereotyped approach of the placement of memorial architecture and monuments during the post-war period. A monument did not necessarily represent a dominant spatial element for Ravnikar. The environment did not have to be subordinated; on the contrary, the new intervention had to enhance an existing environment. He took the environment, the natural landscape of the area, as a frame in which he would place his work.