Notes on the Artistic Research Project It Rains Differently by Dušica Dražić
The first location visit to the evergreen Forest on the karst Pešter plateau in southwest Serbia took place from August 22 to 30, 2023 as part of my artistic research and development of the film entitled It Rains Differently. I was joined by Hannes Boeck (DOP), Bojan Palikuća (sound designer), Tanja Šljivar (dramaturg), and Mirjana Dragosavljević (art historian and activist) to work on a portrait of the forest as a fictional character.
The film is a meditation on collective labor, on an imaginary that fulfills itself through the form of Forest, who is in constant creation and thus manages to persist throughout all the changes. Forest – a transnational, political, social, and cultural collective body.
Written by Dušica Dražić.
Visit to still active nursery Uvac. Ivan Kaličanin, forestry technician, shows us a one-year-old pine seedling produced here and explains the technology of production and reforestation.
Hannes Boeck (DOP) – location hunting and test shoot for the film It Rains Differently.
Bojan Palikuća (sound designer) – location hunting and test shoot for the film It Rains Differently.
Remains of the kitchen used during the 1978–1988 reforestation actions with writing on the wall “Ovde se kuju novi ljudi” (“New people are forged here”).
Mirjana Dragosavljević (art historian and activist) recording Forest.
Tanja Šljivar (dramaturg) with Mirjana Dragosavljević during a research trip to Gutavica.
Dušica Dražić (artist) and Tanja Šljivar during a research trip.
Photographs by Drušica Dražić and Mirjana Dragosavljević.
It Rains Differently is produced by Escautville/BE, co-produced by Out of Sight/BE within the Forest Encounters project co-funded by the European Union, and Diasporama/RS. It is co-funded by the European Union, the Flemish Audio-Visual Fund, and supported by a.o. Forest Institute Belgrade, MORPHO, KAAP…
Special thanks to: Ljubinko Rakonjac, Ivan Kaličanin, Željko Kaličanin, Enis, Murat Tarić and his son Asmir, Milutin and Dragana Dražić, Rade Rakonjac, and the many others who shared their memories and personal stories about Forest.