Phil Grey from darkroom was recently invited to visit the History Museum in Sarajevo. Founded in 1945 to celebrate the Partizan involvement in the defeat of the Nazi’s, it moved in 1963 to the Modernist building designed by three architects from Zagreb, Boris Magas, Edo Smidihen and Radovan Horvat.
The museum has a huge photographic archive and one of the only darkrooms in the whole of Bosnia (and possibly the entire Balkan region), which they want to make more accessible to students and the general public.
While there, Phil gave a printing demonstration to a group including museum staff, local academics and students, most of whom had never been in a darkroom before, much less experienced the magic of seeing a print appear before their eyes in a tray of developer!
In the ensuing feedback discussion there was general agreement that everything possible ought to be done to ensure that this valuable resource is kept, maintained and made more accessible in the future.
