Years of sound living: Mikser festival in Savamala (2012-2016)
Keywords:
soundscape, soundwalk, Mikser Festival, Belgrade, SavamalaAbstract
This article deals with the soundscape of Mikser, an independent festival of contemporary creativity, established in 2009 in Belgrade, the capital city of Serbia. I focus on the years 2012–2016, during which Mikser was taking place in Savamala, an urban quarter in central Belgrade – which itself has undergone various urbanistic and cultural transformations in recent years. The creative team behind Mikser aimed to turn Savamala into a permanent fixture on the map of Belgrade nightlife and a tourist hotspot; the fact that they did not succeed was on account both of financial issues and conflicting top-down business interests. My conclusion is that the long-term survival of the festival is not dependent on its program or audiences, but on securing official support and infrastructure.
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Sources
Documentation of Mikser Festival: press releases, programs, posters, flyers, etc.
Website of the project City Sonic Ecology – Urban Soundscapes of Bern, Ljubljana and Belgrade,http://citysonicecology.org
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