Description

Haludovo Palace (The Penthouse) is an acrylic painting on canvas framed in a walnut finish wood frame.

This painting of concrete utopia is based on the Haludovo Palace Hotel. The Brutalist style architecture was designed by Boris Magaš. When the hotel opened it was known locally as The Penthouse Hotel. The hotel had an casino and club (funded by the Penthouse Magazine’s Bob Guccione, who invested $43 million into it).

The Penthouse Adriatic Club (casino) opened in soviet Yugoslavia (Croatia) in 1972. It attracted and hosted celebrities, the super rich and world leaders across the globe. The guests were said to have been served champagne and lobster by the hotels “Penthouse Pets” – young women (mostly locals) dressed in corsets and high heels. Guccione pumped millions more into the club but within a year the casino went bust.

The hotel went on to serve as a luxury holiday resort until after the Balkan wars in 1991. Later, it became a shelter for refugees. It closed for good in 2002. In its currents state there is a beautiful melancholy to it. With its damaged interior and largely covered in graffiti, the incredible concrete structure (a point of architectural relevance) is almost as it was, if not a little scruffy. It survives and endures like a war veteran with its scars and tattoos.