A&A Interior Gallery is thrilled to invite you to a lecture dedicated to the architecture and the urbanism traditions in the Bay of Kotor.
Within the exhibition titled Bay of Kotor: Stage of Light and Air our gallery will host two members of Montenegro Context Lab art and research project.
Stone, Sea, and Mountain: an Architecture Portrait of the Bay of Kotor is the first part of this interactive talk. The lecturer, Natalia Makarenkova, is an architect and an urbanist. A professional in territory analysis and development concepts, her portfolio includes infrastructure and major urban projects. She is an author of research focused on the spatial code of the Bay of Kotor.
Next to deliver a lecture is Anna Ilina, the author of the current exhibition in our gallery, her topic being Why Do We Love Traditional Towns, While Living in Modernist Ones? This question is to be dwelled upon by Anna Ilina, an architect and an artist, the founder of CLEVERS Studio, a studio specializing in urban design, traditional architecture, and museum projects.
Montenegro Context Lab was born in Montenegro as my artistic research project – my way of exploring the landscape, the memory and the local identity. Through watercolour, I try not only to represent a place but to experience it – to grasp the unique relationships between the sea, the mountains, and the architecture. As an architect, it is important for me to read a place beyond the image: through the silhouettes of fortresses against the sky and buildings embedded in the terrain. The brush allows me to feel the site and to reveal details that photography cannot convey. I am fascinated by the natural scenography of the fjord and the relationship of scale between the mountains and the architecture.
Here, architecture does not exist separately – it merges into the environment. Montenegro is a stage of light and air, where the silhouette becomes the key element of meaning: a roofline, a cliff, a pine tree – all part of the same language. Architecture is integrated into an existing composition, subtly shaping the tension within the field. What matters is seeing the whole, maintaining balance, and perceiving the environment broadly, panoramically. The Montegrin identity is not a style but a way of seeing: architecture here is not a form but a state of light, colour, and air.
Anna Ilina, an architect and an artist
Date: 20 May 2026 at 6 p.m.
Place: A&A Interior Art and Design Gallery
Address: RPCR Aqua Residence, Porto Montenegro
Free entrance, RSVP office@aainterior.me
Stone, Sea, and Mountain: an Architecture Portrait of the Bay of Kotor is the first part of this interactive talk. The lecturer, Natalia Makarenkova, is an architect and an urbanist. A professional in territory analysis and development concepts, her portfolio includes infrastructure and major urban projects. She is an author of research focused on the spatial code of the Bay of Kotor.
Here, architecture does not exist separately – it merges into the environment. Montenegro is a stage of light and air, where the silhouette becomes the key element of meaning: a roofline, a cliff, a pine tree – all part of the same language. Architecture is integrated into an existing composition, subtly shaping the tension within the field. What matters is seeing the whole, maintaining balance, and perceiving the environment broadly, panoramically. The Montegrin identity is not a style but a way of seeing: architecture here is not a form but a state of light, colour, and air.
Anna Ilina, an architect and an artist
Place: A&A Interior Art and Design Gallery
Address: RPCR Aqua Residence, Porto Montenegro
Free entrance, RSVP office@aainterior.me
