The Storm and the Return Home / Oluja i povratak kući
Vahida Ramujkić, Dionis Escorsa, 2018
Two-channel video installation
The work was conceived as a two-channel video installation. For online viewing, the two channels have been combined into a single video.
SR
Povod za nastanak ovog rada bio je krajnje ličan. Moja baka je za svoj osamdeset i neki rođendan poželela da zajedno posetimo njeno rodno mesto Primišlje, malo mesto u Kordunu u koje nije kročila gotovo pola veka. Primišlje je napustila još 1939. godine, kada su je, kao najstariju od sedmoro dece, po završenoj osnovnoj školi roditelji poslali „da izučava zanat u prestonici“. Nakon stradanja koja je njena porodica pretrpela tokom Drugog svetskog rata, svi su se već prvih mirnodopskih godina malo-pomalo iselili u Srbiju.
Moje odrastanje velikim delom bilo je vezano za bakine priče i sećanja iz sopstvenog detinjstva — pašnjake gde je vodila ovce na ispašu, od kojih je jedna bila crna i zvala se Gara, po kojoj je i dobila nadimak; izvore sa kojih je donosila vodu; brda iza kojih je zalazilo sunce, označavajući da je vreme za povratak kući; reku Mrežnicu, gde je prala veš kada se pojavio vuk i gde je timarila konje kada se nad klisuru spustila nepamćena oluja, pa je morala da zajaše neosedlanog konja da bi se vratila kući — pored mnogo još čega. Taj živopisni svet, izgrađen dečjom maštom, zadugo je postojao samo u mojoj glavi i sve do ovog trenutka nisam nimalo sumnjala da će tu i ostati. Bakina iskazana želja da ovo mesto, za mene sazdano iz njenih priča, zaista posetimo bila je otrežnjujuća — moje fantazije mogu dobiti uporište u realnosti; štaviše, one sve ovo vreme egzistiraju u materijalnom obliku kojem i sama mogu posvedočiti!
Pripreme za put nisu išle glatko. Baka je trebalo da izvadi pasoš da bi mogla da putuje u Hrvatsku, a pritom se našla na udaru kritika svoje braće i sestara, koji su bili veoma ogorčeni tadašnjom političkom situacijom između Hrvatske i Srbije. Ovaj revolt bio je plod nataloženih iskustava još iz Drugog svetskog rata, a sada je dodatno bio pojačan događanjima devedesetih. Ipak, uspeli smo da prebrodimo sve teškoće i krenemo na put leta 2006: moja baka, majka, bivši suprug, koji je nosio kameru i vozio nas kombijem, i ja.
Primišlje zatičemo opustošeno od ljudi. Duž puta nižu se ruševine porodičnih kuća i javnih zgrada — škole, pošte, mesnog ureda, policijske stanice i ambulante — koje sada tiho, neprimetnom sporošću, proždire vegetacija. Ponekad čak postaje teško razaznati koje ruševine potiču iz Drugog svetskog rata, a koje iz devedesetih. Memorijalne ploče žrtvama fašizma razbijene su i neme. Ponegde naiđemo na tipske kućice sazidane od ciglenih blokova, bez fasade — sve su identične — u kojima žive povratnici. Moja baka, koja je i naš vodič na ovom putovanju, živahno se probija kroz visoku travu i trnje, ne libi se da odmah stupi u razgovor sa njima i uvek uspeva da pronađe nekog zajedničkog daljeg rođaka ili druga iz osnovne škole. Po pravilu, to su ljudi zašli u duboku starost koji su, nakon godina izbeglištva, odlučili da ostatak života provedu „na svome“.
Povratak u Primišlje odužio se tokom još tri leta — 2007, 2008. i 2009. godine — a naš poduhvat prolazio je kroz razne faze: baka je pričala svoja sećanja i prepričavala ih u novim verzijama i sa izmenjenim detaljima; šira porodica konačno je odlučila da preuzme nasledstvo nad razbacanim parcelicama pašnjaka koji onomad nisu otišli u zadružni fond; a Dionis i ja čuli smo sijaset priča od ljudi iz Primišlja i okolnih mesta — kako od onih koji su se nakon Oluje mogli vratiti, tako i od onih koji su tada morali da odu, a mogli su da se vrate tek mnogo godina kasnije.
Dvokanalni film predstavlja segment rada koji možda nikada neće biti završen.
Oluja i povratak kući, HD dvokanalni video, trajanje: 90 min.
Autori: Vahida Ramujkić i Dionis Eskorsa, 2018.
EN
The impetus for this work was deeply personal. For her eighty-something birthday, my grandmother wished for us to visit Primišlje together, her birthplace, a small village in the Kordun region that she had not set foot in for almost half a century. She had left Primišlje in 1939, when, as the eldest of seven children, her parents sent her to the capital after completing primary school “to learn a trade.” Following the suffering her family endured during the Second World War, they all gradually moved to Serbia during the first years of peace.
Much of my childhood was bound up with my grandmother’s stories and memories of her own early years—the pastures where she took the sheep to graze, including a black one named Gara, after whom she received her nickname; the springs from which she fetched water; the hills behind which the sun would set, signalling that it was time to return home; the River Mrežnica, where she was washing clothes when a wolf appeared, and where she was grooming the horses when an unprecedented storm descended over the gorge, forcing her to mount an unsaddled horse in order to make it home—and so much else besides. This vivid world, constructed through a child’s imagination, existed for a long time only in my mind, and until that moment I had never doubted that it would remain there. My grandmother’s expressed wish that we actually visit this place, which for me had been fashioned from her stories, was sobering: my fantasies could acquire a foothold in reality; indeed, all this time they had existed in a material form to which I, too, could bear witness.
Preparations for the journey did not go smoothly. My grandmother needed to obtain a passport in order to travel to Croatia, and at the same time she came under criticism from her brothers and sisters, who were deeply embittered by the political situation between Croatia and Serbia at the time. Their resentment was the product of experiences accumulated since the Second World War, now further intensified by the events of the 1990s. Nevertheless, we managed to overcome all the difficulties and set off in the summer of 2006: my grandmother, my mother, my former husband, who carried the camera and drove us in a van, and me.
We found Primišlje devastated and almost entirely devoid of people. Along the road stood the ruins of family homes and public buildings—the school, post office, local administrative office, police station and health clinic—which vegetation was now quietly devouring with imperceptible slowness. At times it was difficult to distinguish which ruins dated from the Second World War and which from the 1990s. Memorial plaques dedicated to the victims of fascism were shattered and mute. Here and there, we came across standardised little houses built from bare brick blocks, without façades—all identical—where returnees lived. My grandmother, who was also our guide on this journey, moved energetically through the tall grass and thorns, never hesitating to strike up a conversation with them and always managing to discover a distant relative or a former schoolmate they had in common. As a rule, these were people of advanced age who, after years spent in exile, had decided to live out the rest of their lives “on their own land.”
Our return to Primišlje extended over three more summers—2007, 2008 and 2009—and our undertaking passed through various phases: my grandmother told and retold her memories in new versions and with altered details; the extended family finally decided to claim their inheritance of the scattered plots of pastureland that had not, back then, been absorbed into the cooperative land fund; and Dionis and I heard countless stories from people in Primišlje and the surrounding places—both from those who were able to return after Operation Storm and from those who had to leave at that time and were only able to return many years later.
The two-channel film represents one segment of a body of work that may never be completed.
The Storm and the Return Home, two-channel HD video,
duration: 90 min.
Authors: Vahida Ramujkić and Dionis Escorsa, 2018.