Mirjana Savić, museum advisor of the National Museum Kraljevo and Ljubinka Škodrić, PhD, senior scientific associate of the Institute for Contemporary History in Belgrade, as the author team of the exhibition “Children in War: Serbian Refugee Homes in Mataruška Banja 1942-1944” of the National Museum Kraljevo and the monograph of the same name, awarded is the “Mihailo Valtrović” award of the Serbian Museum Association in the category “to an individual or an author’s team for exceptional results in 2023”. This distinguished museum recognition was awarded at the ceremonial session of the Assembly of the Serbian Museum Association, which was held in the Svetosavski dom in Niš, on Monday, September 30th, 2024.
The prize was awarded based on the recommendations of Sanja Petrović Todosijević, PhD (Institute for the Recent History of Serbia), Gordan Bojković, PhD (National Museum Požarevac), Milan Koljanin, PhD (Memorial Complex Staro Sajmište), Aleksandra Novakov, PhD (Matica srpska), Lela Pavlović (Intermunicipal Historical Archive Čačak) and Aleksandra Orašanin, MSc, (Faculty of Philology of the University in Belgrade).
In the explanation of the Commission for awarding awards, among other things, it is stated: “The exhibition and monograph presented the care of refugee children who arrived from different territories of the occupied and dismembered Kingdom of Yugoslavia, organized by the Commissariat for Refugees and Immigrants, with the support of the authorities and the Red Cross.Thus, Mataruška Banja became one of the most important humanitarian centers in Serbia during the Second World War. From June 3rd, 1942 to November 29th, 1944, more than 3,445 children found refuge in the Serbian refugee homes in Mataruška Banja, 56 of whom died. All aspects of refugee children’s life are presented in detail. They showed the daily life of children and their parents during the Second World War in the refugee homes of Mataruška Banja.
This important topic was marginalized for years and for the first time it was presented to the public according to the highest museum criteria and standards. There is a special impression of hope and humanity over all the horrors of war. The authors managed to make the topic of refugees visible and recognized by a wide audience. A handful of photos from personal and museum archives and museum exhibits testify to the difficult situation in which these children found themselves. The multimedia concept of the exhibition contributed to a special emotional impression at the exhibition with a video recording of interviews with direct witnesses. The monograph describes the functioning of refugee homes and represents indispensable literature in the reconstruction of the lives of the most sensitive category of the population – children, in the whirlwind of war events.”
The significance of this project is reflected in its layered processing and multimedia presentation of the topic through an exhibition, a monograph and two documentaries filmed with the former cadets, produced by “Hram” Television and “Krug” Portal.