Zdenko Strižić

Portrait of Zdenko Strižić by unknown photographer

Zdenko Strižić (May 19, 1902, Bjelovar; Nov 1, 1990, Hannover) was a Croatian architect, urban planner and teacher.

Education

Strižić studied in Dresden (1921–3) and Berlin (1924–6), where his teacher was the prominent German architect Hans Poelzig. In 1925, Strižić went on a short study tour of Venice, drawing vedutas with characteristic Venetian motifs, some of which he was to translate into his architectural design. As a student he met and married a German-born textile designer, then studying sculpture, painting and craft in Berlin, who later contributed to Zdenko's practice. Their son Marko was born in 1928.

Architect

After finishing his studies, Strižić continued working for Poelzig's "Meisteratelier" as an assistant and undertook, together with his mentor, a succession of projects for apartment houses (1929) on the Bülowplatz (now Luxemburgplatz), Berlin; the famous Babylon theatre/cinema (1929), Berlin; and a casino (1930) for I. G. Farbenindustrie, Frankfurt am Main.

Major award

Zdenko Strižić (1930) Maquette for the contest for design of the theatre in Kharkov.

Strižić achieved considerable success by winning his first international award (1930) for the Opera House, Kharkov (now Kharkiv). There were 114 contestants with Poelzig, Le Courbusier, Gropius, brothers Vesnin, Max Taut and Auguste Perret among them. Strižić's project was awarded the first prize, ex aequo with Alfred Karsten and of a group of Russian architects called Kolektiv, bringing international renown for modem Croatian architecture.

Stalin, who was then enforcing Soviet Realism, attacked the project in Pravda for displaying bourgeois tendencies.

From 1931 to 1933 Strižić operated his own practice in Berlin designing, with Franz Xaver Holzbauer (1900–52), several buildings in Austria, Germany, Czech Republic, and Sweden. He was mainly involved in solving urban planning issues, regulation of cities, city quarters, and historical city zones, as well as in designing residential houses in a series of projects; Ribnjak 38, 1932; the First Croatian Savings Bank estate in Trešnjevka; row houses, Zagreb, 1935. Strižić was engaged throughout this time in numerous urban-planning competitions (many unexecuted): including for Jelačić Square (1929), Zagreb; and for a beach development.

Photographer

He was also occupied with art photography and his motifs were mostly architecture in the old part of Zagreb (Lights and Shadows, 1955).

Escape from Yugoslavia

In 1955, Strižić escaped illegally from what was then Yugoslavia. But despite being forced to leave, his work was uninterrupted. After emigrating, Strižić collaborated in Berin with Peter Poelzig, son of Hans Poelzig for a time, and at the beginning of 1956 he went to Australia after his son, the photographer Mark Strizic, who had arrived there in 1950.

Professor of architecture

At the end of the war Strižić was elected to the Faculty of Architecture of the then Technical College of Zagreb as a professor in the department of design (1946–1955), where he worked on the completion of the Susak-Rijeka bridge and the landscaping of its surroundings and design of the Plitvice Lakes National Park with projects for the hotel pavilion, restoration, bathing area and pier on the lake.

After fleeing Yugoslavia, Strižić joined the faculty of the University of Melbourne (1956–1961), writing a thesis, collaborating on many publications, and returned to designing. His project for the Australian House of Representatives (1956-1962) was awarded the first prize in a major competition. In the late 1950s, Strizic taught at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in the United States, and later collaborated with the International Academy of Architecture and Town Planning at the UN. He was invited to Braunschweig in the 1960s to establish a third design department at the university of the time and from 1962 on, he lectured at the High Technical School in Braunschweig. There, Strižić became interested in the current topic of airport architecture and planning, which he followed with some notable studies. In 1968, Strižić's book "Wohnbauten", the third sequel to previous books on architectural design, was published.

In the late 1960s and through the 1970s, Strižić produced notable projects; in 1967, in conjunction with the Schweitzer Atelier, he received the first award for the Brake-Niederweser School Centre, and in 1970 he was awarded the performance of the Kanzelerfeld Centre with over two hundred apartments. He published articles and reviews in the field of architecture and urban planning in, Croatian and foreign journals. He was lecturer and mentor of Vjenceslav Richter, influencing his respect for Bauhaus principles.

Zdenko Strižić died on 1 November 1990 in Braunschweig, where he was buried.

Publications

• * Strižić, Zdenko (1947). 'Regulaciona osnova Zadra.' Arhitektura, 1(1-2), 9-12.
• Strizic, Zdenko (1952–56), Arhitektonsko projektiranje, Zagreb{{citation}}: CS1 maint: date format (link)
• Strizic, Zdenko (January 01, 1953). Zadatci prostora: Odlomak iz knjige u pripremi: "Arhitektonsko projektovanje, 2. dio - Problemi stanovanja". Arhitekt, 6-11. ('Tasks of Space: An excerpt from a book in preparation: "Architectural Design, Part 2 - Housing Problems."' The Architect, 6-11.)
• Strizic, Zdenko. (1953). Der jugoslawische Nationalpark: die Seen von Plitvice und die touristischen Bauten. W. Jegher & A. Ostertag.
• Strizic, Zdenko (1954) 'Der Architekt und das architektonische Erbe in Jugoslawien,' in Schweizerische Bauzeitung, Vol.: 72 (1954) Issue 15, 1954
• Strizic, Zdenko (1955). Svijetla i sjene. Jedna monografija Zagreba. [Photographs, with text in Serbocroatian, French, English and German. With a map.]. 222 pages. Zagreb
• Strizic, Zdenko (1958), Architectural design : general considerations and housing problems
• Strizic, Zdenko (1965). Architekt und Fotografie. (Place of publication unknown).
• Strizic, Z., & Braunschweig (Germany). (1966). Einfamilienhäuser. Braunschweig: Technische Hochschule.
• Strizic, Zdenko (1975), Schriften, publications, 1935-1975, Braunschweig
• Strižíc, Z., Koschel, R., & Technische Hochschule Carolo-Wilhelmina zu Braunschweig. (1967). Flugempfangsgebäude: Ein Forschungsbericht. Braunschweig: Technische Hochschule.
• Strizic, Z. (1978). Elemente und Ordnungsprinzipien der islamischen Stadtstruktur als konstiuierende Merkmale einer humanen Umwelt: Ein Forschungsbericht. Braunschweig.
• Strižić, Zdenko (1997), O stanovanju : arhitektonsko projektiranje, Nakladništvo udruženja hrvatskih arhitekata, ISBN 978-953-96057-4-0

Publications about

• Gjuro, S., Zdunić, D., Strižić, Z., Dabac, T., Kirin, V., & Petlevski, O. (1990). Stari Zagreb. Zagreb: Nakladni zavod Matice hrvatske.
• Galović, K. (1997). Architect Zdenko Strižić—Project for the theatre in Harkov (1930). Peristil: zbornik radova za povijest umjetnosti, 40(1), 137-147.
• Lozić, V., Kuzmić, Z., & Strižić, Z. (January 01, 2004). Struktura, obris i sjena: Iz zbirke hrvatska fotografije Fotokluba Zagreb : Zdenko Stržić. Vijenac.