A walk around Korčula through the second half of the 20th century, Collection of slides by Alena Fazinić

Abstract

Art historian Alena Fazinić (born in 1930) is an important scientist for the Island of Korčula and Dalmatia, and the respectable curator and director of the City Museum of Korčula, who recorded several hundred slides, including numerous motifs of the City of Korčula and its surroundings in the second half of the 20th century. Although the photographer is an amateur and her work is not devoid of technical imperfections, the collection is a significant documentary testimony, partly due to the fact that its creator is an expert in choosing the selected motifs and locations. She donated her slides to the Archival Centre Korčula-Lastovo in 2014, and the collection was organized into nine thematic series the following year. In early 2023, an analytical inventory was created and each individual record was identified in detail with the help of a number of Korčula locals, available literature and newspaper articles. The results of this work significantly expanded the previously defined time span of the slides, as well as the knowledge about their value. It has been shown that digitization is a prerequisite for the complete organization of a collection. These slides are not only a document of existing antiquities in the old town, but also of the frequent spatial changes in Korčula and its surroundings from the end of the 1950s to the end of the 1990s, as well as the first museological displays (in the Abbey Treasury and the City Museum of Korčula), which were significantly redesigned in the 21st century. As such, they not only enable a walk through space and time, but are valuable records that can significantly help in the valuation of the spatial and cultural heritage of Korčula. This is a heritage that, under the influence of tourism, is increasingly changing and adapting to the new needs of life. The text includes a list of prominent slides with their detailed description and approximate dating.