Goli otok
— — the island that kept what it heard.
Not only on a wall.
“A bare limestone island in the northern Adriatic, off the island of Rab. From 1949 to 1988 it held the Yugoslav political prison where Tito's government sent supporters of Stalin after the 1948 split with the Cominform. Estimates put the total number of inmates at more than 16,000. The camp closed; the buildings are still standing, roofless in places, in full sun. Day boats run from Lopar on Rab in summer.
Goli otok, on ceramic.
Each tile is finished by hand in our Knoxville studio. Artwork is slowly infused into the ceramic surface under high heat and pressure, and rests beneath a thin glossy finish. The colour lives in the surface, not on top of it.
Pick any four 4-inch tiles — National Parks you've been to, a Smokies set, the four seasons of one place. $ for a set of , cork-backed, ready to live on the table.
The place, in three passes.
Goli otok, literally barren island, is an uninhabited island of roughly 4.5 square kilometres in the Kvarner Gulf of the northern Adriatic, about two kilometres off the northern tip of the island of Rab. The bedrock is bare karst limestone with almost no soil and no trees of any size; the name describes exactly what it is. Croatia has administered the island since 1991 and it carries no permanent population. The Tramuntana wind shapes the few hardy junipers that hold to the lee slopes.
The prison opened in July 1949, a year after the Tito-Stalin split, to hold Yugoslav citizens accused of remaining loyal to Stalin and the Cominform. The regime closed it as a political prison in 1956 but continued to use the camp for ordinary prisoners until 1988. Estimates of the total number of inmates across those four decades sit above 16,000, with several thousand deaths. Many of the testimonies were not published in Yugoslavia until after 1980. The site has been left largely as it was abandoned.
Day excursions run from Lopar on Rab through the summer season, typically a forty-minute crossing, with most boats including a small lunch stop in the old harbour. The buildings stand open to weather: barracks, a stone quarry where the prisoners worked, an administrative block, and a small museum room near the dock. There is no shade and no fresh water on the island. The Croatian government has so far chosen not to develop a formal memorial; the place is allowed to speak for itself.