Sarajevo’s Newlyweds
Photo: Danilo Krstanović
Sanela and Emir Klarić married in besieged Sarajevo in 1995. In the photograph, the newlyweds are walking down Kulovićeva Street. In the backdrop we see the canvas spread between the buildings for protection from sniper fire from the adjacent hills. The portrait of the happy newlyweds has come to represent Sarajevo’s resistance, optimism, and trust in a brighter future. It is now regarded as one of the most significant photos in the history of war photography. Sanela and Emir have two daughters and are still married.
Bensedin
Bensedin is the local name for a benzodiazepine tranquilizer used to treat anxiety and other similar disorders. It has been in use since the 1960s. Excessive use and misuse of benzodiazepines became widespread in Serbia and the region throughout the 1990s and is strongly connected to socioeconomic and political instability. Benzodiazepines were widely available in pharmacies, even without a prescription, contributing to their widespread misuse and addiction. The popularity of these drugs has endured to this day. According to a study published in The Lancet in December 2021 that examined 65 countries from 2008 to 2019, Serbia and Croatia are at the top when it comes to the use of these medications.
Flavor Aid
Source: “The Museum of Objects”, Kiosk (the project by Ana Adamović, James May i Milica Pekić); from the collection of the Museum of Yugoslavia
Donor: Aleksandra Jovankin
1976 / Novi Sad / Kraljevo / Pedagogue /
Donors’ place of residence during the 1990s: Novi Sad
Object title: Box Flavor Aid
Place that the object relates to: Kraljevo
Question: What does this object represent for you?
Answer: Flavor Aid juice was sold in small bags, it was like a powder concentrate, you would mix it in the water. We loved to drink them. We would call it “Fjavorajt”, I remember we liked to stick our tongues into a bag (which our parents disapproved), and our tongues would end up colored. From the position of today’s concern of what we eat, about organic food and calories, these chemical products certainly wouldn’t gain our sympathies, but we drank, licked, enjoyed Fjavorajt and here we are, pretty healthy grownups in the new century!
Question: Why did you donate the object?
Answer: We loved these juices. Besides some childish joy I feel every time I see this box, it also has one more special meaning. We kept letters in it. At the beginning of nineties, I would secretly read letters exchanged between my sister and her boyfriend who was in the army at the time. That’s why inside there are army stickers. This box is more of a memory and a moving keepsake to the beginning of the nineties, when we already yearned for old times, because then everything started to fall apart…
Santa Claus (1995)
The 1995 video depicts the coming of “Santa Claus” in a neighborhood of besieged Sarajevo. It was published on the Sniper Alley page (https://sniperalley.photo), which Džemil Hodžić created to document life under siege in memory of his 16-year-old brother killed by sniper fire in 1995.
Christmas (1992)
Title: “Being thrown into an ideology” (Bačenost u ideologiju), from private collection
Source: Prezup.č
