At a press conference held at the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts on Tuesday, 22 September, SASA Executive Director Bojan Bugarčić, PhD, spoke about the upcoming elections of new members of the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts and the elections of new officials, both scheduled for 2027. The Head of the Public Relations Office, Dragana Mladenović, presented the programme of activities planned for the remainder of the year.

As Dr Bugaričić pointed out, the following year will see the elections of new officials scheduled for the end of March 2027, as well as the elections of new members (corresponding, full and foreign) of the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts, scheduled for November 2027.

This year is marked by preparations for the Academy’s election processes, with preparations for the elections of new SASA members intensifying in the last quarter of the year. By the end of October, the SASA Presidency will set the date for the Election Assembly and determine the deadlines for the completion of the various election activities.

SASA has faced another challenge, namely the disproportionately low number of women among its members. The 2024 elections brought positive developments in this regard: of the 22 candidates elected, 12 were new female members of the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts. Dr Bugarčić expressed his hope that the 2027 elections for membership of the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts would also be successful, both in terms of the overall number of candidates elected and concerning gender equality.

The fact that the Academy currently has 24 female members, and that 12 women were elected to membership of the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts in the most recent elections, testifies to the progress made during the 2024 election cycle.

The Statute of the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts stipulates that, when proposing candidates for election to the Academy, due consideration should be given to achieving a balance among individual fields of science and art, particularly between the number of members from the social sciences and humanities, on the one hand, and the natural and technical sciences, on the other, as well as among the individual departments.

The renaming of the Academy’s Department of Fine and Musical Arts as the Department of Arts in 2020 was cited as a positive outcome of the efforts made by the Academy’s leadership to improve the election process. This change facilitated the expansion of the Academy’s membership to other fields of art, such as directing and scenography.

As regards the number of members in individual departments, the situation was particularly critical in the Department of Social Sciences, which gained four new corresponding members in the last election cycle. Hope was expressed that next year’s elections would bring improvements in this area as well.

With regard to the election of officials of the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts, Dr Bugarčić pointed out that the Assembly at which the president, vice-presidents and general secretary will be elected, will be held at the end of March next year. At least 15 days before the Assembly, a Conference of SASA Members is held to consider proposals for candidates for these positions, i.e. for the leadership of the Academy.

Candidates for president, vice-presidents and general secretary are proposed by exactly 20 Academy members. Candidates who receive a majority of the votes of the total number of Academy members are elected to these positions. The public will be informed of the details of the election of Academy officials after the Election Assembly is convened in 2027.

Speaking about the Academy’s activities, Dragana Mladenović pointed out that a rich programme of events is planned at SASA and its branches in Novi Sad and Niš, as well as at the SASA Centre for Scientific Research of the University of Kragujevac, for the remainder of the year.

On 23 September, SASA will host Saša Cvetkovski, Corresponding Member of the Macedonian Academy of Sciences and Arts (MANU), who will deliver a lecture entitled Wall Paintings of the Monastery of St George – Knežino near Kičevo. This week, the scientific conference Numerical Modelling of Weather and Climate: The Present and a Vision of the Future will be held (24–25 September).

Three ceremonial sessions are scheduled for the following week, dedicated to the centenary of the birth of Academician Stevan O. Karamata (28 September), the 200th anniversary of the birth of Ljubomir Nenadović (29 September), and the centenary of the birth of Academician Radoslav Anđus (30 September).

Among the events scheduled for October, a panel discussion entitled The Demography of Election Results will be held on 2 October, organised by the Board for the Study of Population of the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts.

The ceremonial opening of the music studio of Academician and composer Ivan Jevtić will be held on 5 October. On this occasion, Academician Jevtić will officially bequeath his entire musical oeuvre to the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts and the Republic of Serbia.

The SASA Conference on Higher Education in Serbia: Current State and Perspectives is scheduled for 15–16 October. The aim of the conference is to assess the current state of higher education, identify key challenges, and make recommendations for its improvement based on the lectures and discussions of the participants.

The seventh international conference, entitled ANSO 7th Pan-Balkan Alliance of Natural Products and Drug Discovery Associations Conference on Natural Drug Research: Bridging Science and Nature, will take place in Belgrade on 20 and 21 October 2026 in the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts. The conference will bring together researchers and experts from 16 PANDA member countries and partner institutions to exchange the latest scientific findings and promote international cooperation in the field of natural products and new drug research.

As part of SASA’s artistic programme, the 45th concert season at the SASA Gallery will open on 1 October. On this occasion, Alain Crepin, a renowned Belgian classical saxophonist, composer and Professor Emeritus at the Royal Conservatory of Brussels, will perform. The programme will include compositions by Belgian composers, as well as works composed by Crepin himself. The special guest will be saxophonist Milan Savić, Assistant Professor at the Faculty of Music.

The exhibition Even in Captivity: Freedom! Serbian Art during the Second World War by Irina Tomić, PhD, recently closed at the Gallery of the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts. The next exhibition scheduled at the SASA Gallery is The Mastery of the Line, featuring works by the laureates of the Vladimir Veličković Foundation Drawing Award. The exhibition will open on 6 October. Its authors are Miroslav Karić, Danica Đorđević Janković and Mirko Kokir. The exhibition will present works by 40 award-winning artists from different generations and with diverse poetics and artistic approaches, providing a cohesive overview of the heterogeneous practices of contemporary drawing in Serbia over the past two decades.

As part of the Year of Academician Aleksandar Belić programme, which the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts is marking in 2026, a scientific conference entitled Aleksandar Belić – Founder of Serbian Linguistics will be held on 30 November and 1 December. At the end of the year, on 22 December, an exhibition dedicated to the life, work and scientific legacy of one of the most significant Serbian linguists and intellectuals of the 20th century, and a long-serving President of the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts, will open at the Gallery of the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts.

The exhibition is being organised in cooperation with the Institute for the Serbian Language of the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts. It will be curated by Academician Aleksandar Loma, with SASA Corresponding Member Boris Milosavljević serving as expert associate.

Among other highlights, the rich science program at the Gallery of Science and Technology of the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts includes the exhibitions ’The Đerdap Geopark – the First Geopark in the Republic of Serbia’ (25 September 25 – 15 October) and ’On Architecture 2026’, which is planned for December.