[Kortil Live] How to Read the Neighbourhood: Upstream the Rječina River Along the Vodovodna Street

Text by: Marko Smoljan
Translation by: Tajana Mavrinac
Narration by: Alice Renieri and Paola Kirigin (TRY Theatre)
Mentors: Enea Dessardo and Lucia Filičić (TRY Theatre)
Recording and editing by: Ivan Vranjić
Archival materials: Rijeka City Museum, Centre for Industrial Heritage of the University of Rijeka

---

The programme Kortil live is implemented in the city district that includes the zone around the Rječina River and a part of Sušak district in the surroundings of the Croatian Cultural Centre. With its thematic units, it starts from the rich and layered historical-cultural-political symbolism of this urban zone as well as personal experiences and memories of its citizens.
Since 2014, within this project a number of activities have been carried out such as workshops, curatorial and artistic projects, actions and interventions in public space, exhibitions, fairs, lectures, street art and street festivals.

Through the activities of the Kortil live programme, volunteering is promoted, and the contribution that volunteers make to the community in various ways is particularly evaluated and emphasized.

In the year 2020, in which Rijeka held the title of European Capital of Culture, we dealt with Rječina, the values and roles that this, only 17 km long river has in the multi-layered history of the city. Water not only shaped our city, it also marked its development. It separated and connected banks, states and people with the neighbourhood and the world. It was a border and a bridge. A dividing line and a point of unification. A source of adversity and problems, but also a source of health, strength, energy. It conditioned the development of trade, industry and maritime affairs. It marked historical changes and events in the city named after it.

Called How to Read the Neighbourhood, this year we wanted to make past invisible traces visible, through story, walk, photos, and memories ... from the benches along the A. Kačić Miošić Promenade.

Activities carried out during the year included: the Society of Art Historians of Rijeka, the Construction and Technical School, the First Croatian Gymnasium in Rijeka, students of the School of Applied Arts Rijeka, the Rijeka City Museum, the Centre for Industrial Heritage of the University of Rijeka, the Centre for Innovative Media of the Academy of Applied Arts of the University of Rijeka, ECoC (European Capital of Culture) volunteers, the Sušak Citizens’ Club, and the TryTheatre Rijeka.

The programme is supported by The City of Rijeka – City Department of Culture, Rijeka Local Partnership Programme, and Rijeka 2020 - European Capital of Culture.