VENUE

Arkadija, Auditorium 1

Arkadija was the first LGBTI+ organisation in Serbia. It was the first group to affirm lesbian and gay human rights and culture in Serbia, established on January 13, 1991, and registered in 1994 in Belgrade. The organization was inspired by the Gay-Lesbian Pink Club initiative from Ljubljana, whose organizers contacted LGBTI+ activists from Serbia in October 1990. “Arkadija” means “the land of love and freedom”. The basic function of the organization was lobbying towards the media in order to decriminalize homosexuality. In addition, members' activities focused on the abolition of all forms of discrimination against homosexuals in public state institutions.

Arkadija is the biggest auditorium at Pride House, also known as “Velika sala”, and is located on the minus one floor.

Dejan, Auditorium 2

Dejan (Nebrigić) was the founder of "Arkadija", the first lesbian and gay activist group in Serbia, and was one of the first LGBTI+ and peace activists in Serbia to publicly come out as gay. In 1991, he co-founded the anti-militarist and peace journal Pacifik, and in 1992 and 1993, he was the editor of its lesbian and gay pages. In 1998 and 1999, Dejan was the Executive Director of the "Campaign Against Homophobia" which was supported by the Humanitarian Law Center and the European Youth Association. Alongisde the lesbian group "Labris", Dejan, and his organisation "Arkadija" held public events in Belgrade to coincide with worldwide Gay Pride and international human rights days. He will forever be a cherishable part of the still turbulent history of gay activism in Serbia. Dejan tragically passed away in December 1999.

Dejan Nebrigić is located in the „Sala Amerikana“ auditorium on the first floor of Pride House.

Marsha, Auditorium 3

Marsha (P. Johnson) (born on August 24, 1945) was an African American transgender woman, LGBTI+ rights activist and outspoken advocate for trans people of color. She was one of the prominent figures in the Stonewall uprising of 1969, and some have recognized her as the vanguard of the gay liberation movement in the United States. Johnson was a founding member of the Gay Liberation Front and co-founded the radical activist group Street Transvestite Action Revolutionaries. Marsha died in 1992, her body was found floating in the Hudson River. The NYPD ruled her death as suicide, but controversy followed concerning the cause of death.

Marsha P. Johnson is located next to Dejan Nebrigić, on the first floor, in the „Klub Doma omladine“ auditorium.

Virginia, Auditorium 4

Adeline Virginia Woolf (25 January 1882 – 28 March 1941) was an English writer, considered one of the most important modernist 20th-century authors, and a pioneer in the use of stream of consciousness as a narrative device. Woolf herself enjoyed relationships with both women and her husband Leonard Woolf, whom she married in 1912. Perhaps the most influential relationship and strongest was that with Vita Sackville-West. It is this relationship that many academics believe inspired her novel ‘Orlando: A Biography’. A novel exploring issues around gender and sexuality, it is considered both a feminist and lesbian feminist classic giving Woolf a well-deserved position as an influential LGBT+ novelist. Woolf was extremely talented at incorporating LGBT+ ideas and themes through inferences and undertones within her writing

Virginia Wolf can be reached via elevator, which is located next to the Art Gallery on floor zero, by pressing the button for floor three. The auditorium is also known as “Tribinska sala”.