Latest news with #Manifesto
NZ Herald
28-07-2025
- Entertainment
- NZ Herald
Sarajevo street art marks out brighter future
'I want to be like a positive view. When you see my murals or my artworks, I don't want people to think too much about it. 'It's for everyone.' During the Bosnian war, 1992-1995, Sarajevo endured the longest siege in modern conflict, as Bosnian Serb forces encircled and bombarded the city for 44 months. Attacks on the city left more than 11,500 people dead, injured 50,000 and forced tens of thousands to flee. But in the wake of a difficult peace, that divided the country into two autonomous entities, Bosnia's economy continues to struggle leaving the physical scars of war still evident around the city almost three decades on. Facades of old buildings renovated with murals by Bosnian street artist Benjamin Cengic and his creative team in Sarajevo, pictured in May. Photo / Elvis Barukcic, AFP 'A form of therapy' 'After the war, segregation, politics, and nationalism were very strong, but graffiti and hip-hop broke down all those walls and built new bridges between generations,' local muralist Adnan Hamidovic, also known as rapper Frenkie, said. Frenkie vividly remembers being caught by police early in his career, while tagging trains bound for Croatia in the northwest Bosnian town of Tuzla. The 43-year-old said the situation was still tense then, with police suspecting he was doing 'something political'. For the young artist, only one thing mattered: 'Making the city your own'. Graffiti was a part of Sarajevo life even during the war, from signs warning of sniper fire to a bulletproof barrier emblazoned with the words 'Pink Floyd' - a nod to the band's 1979 album The Wall. Sarajevo Roses - fatal mortar impact craters filled with red resin - remain on pavements and roads around the city as a memorial to those killed in the strikes. When he was young, Frenkie said the thrill of illegally painting gripped him, but it soon became 'a form of therapy' combined with a desire to do something significant in a country still recovering from war. 'Sarajevo, after the war, you can imagine, it was a very, very dark place,' he said at Manifesto gallery where he exhibited earlier this year. 'Graffiti brought life into the city and also colour.' 'A way of resisting' Sarajevo's annual Fasada festival, first launched in 2021, has helped promote the city's muralists while also repairing buildings, according to artist and founder Benjamin Cengic. 'We look for overlooked neighbourhoods, rundown facades,' Cengic said. His team fixes the buildings that will also act as the festival's canvas, sometimes installing insulation and preserving badly damaged homes in the area. The aim is to 'really work on creating bonds between local people, between artists'. Mostar, a city in southern Bosnia, will also host the 14th edition of its annual street art festival in August. With unemployment nearing 30% in Bosnia, street art also offers an important springboard to young artists, University of Sarajevo sociology professor Sarina Bakic said. 'The social context for young people is very difficult,' Bakic said. Ljiljana Radosevic, a researcher at Finland's Jyvaskyla University, said graffiti allowed youth to shake off any 'nationalist narrative or imposed identity'. 'It's a way of resisting,' Radosevic said. - Agence France-Presse
eNCA
28-07-2025
- Entertainment
- eNCA
Sarajevo street art marks out brighter future
SARAJEVO - Bullet holes still pockmark many Sarajevo buildings; others threaten collapse under disrepair, but street artists in the Bosnian capital are using their work to reshape a city steeped in history. A half-pipe of technicolour snakes its way through the verdant Mount Trebevic, once an Olympic bobsled route -- now layered in ever-changing art. "It's a really good place for artists to come here to paint, because you can paint here freely," Kerim Musanovic told AFP, spraycan in hand as he repaired his work on the former site of the 1984 Sarajevo Games. Retouching his mural of a dragon, his painting gallery is this street art hotspot between the pines. Like most of his work, he paints the fantastic, as far removed from the divisive political slogans that stain walls elsewhere in the Balkan nation. AFP | ELVIS BARUKCIC "I want to be like a positive view. When you see my murals or my artworks, I don't want people to think too much about it. "It's for everyone." During the Bosnian war, 1992-1995, Sarajevo endured the longest siege in modern conflict, as Bosnian Serb forces encircled and bombarded the city for 44 months. Attacks on the city left over 11,500 people dead, injured 50,000 and forced tens of thousands to flee. But in the wake of a difficult peace, that divided the country into two autonomous entities, Bosnia's economy continues to struggle leaving the physical scars of war still evident around the city almost three decades on. 'A form of therapy' "After the war, segregation, politics, and nationalism were very strong, but graffiti and hip-hop broke down all those walls and built new bridges between generations," local muralist Adnan Hamidovic, also known as rapper Frenkie, said. Frenkie vividly remembers being caught by police early in his career, while tagging trains bound for Croatia in the northwest Bosnian town of Tuzla. The 43-year-old said the situation was still tense then, with police suspecting he was doing "something political". For the young artist, only one thing mattered: "Making the city your own". Graffiti was a part of Sarajevo life even during the war, from signs warning of sniper fire to a bulletproof barrier emblazoned with the words "Pink Floyd" -- a nod to the band's 1979 album The Wall. Sarajevo Roses -- fatal mortar impact craters filled with red resin -- remain on pavements and roads around the city as a memorial to those killed in the strikes. AFP | ELVIS BARUKCIC When he was young, Frenkie said the thrill of illegally painting gripped him, but it soon became "a form of therapy" combined with a desire to do something significant in a country still recovering from war. "Sarajevo, after the war, you can imagine, it was a very, very dark place," he said at Manifesto gallery where he exhibited earlier this year. "Graffiti brought life into the city and also colour." 'A way of resisting' Sarajevo's annual Fasada festival, first launched in 2021, has helped promote the city's muralists while also repairing buildings, according to artist and founder Benjamin Cengic. AFP | ELVIS BARUKCIC "We look for overlooked neighbourhoods, rundown facades," Cengic said. His team fixes the buildings that will also act as the festival's canvas, sometimes installing insulation and preserving badly damaged homes in the area. The aim is to "really work on creating bonds between local people, between artists". Mostar, a city in southern Bosnia, will also host the 14th edition of its annual street art festival in August. With unemployment nearing 30 percent in Bosnia, street art also offers an important springboard to young artists, University of Sarajevo sociology professor Sarina Bakic said. "The social context for young people is very difficult," Bakic said. Ljiljana Radosevic, a researcher at Finland's Jyvaskyla University, said graffiti allowed youth to shake off any "nationalist narrative or imposed identity". "It's a way of resisting," Radosevic said. by Anne-sophie Labadie
Int'l Business Times
28-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Int'l Business Times
Sarajevo Street Art Marks Out Brighter Future
Bullet holes still pockmark many Sarajevo buildings; others threaten collapse under disrepair, but street artists in the Bosnian capital are using their work to reshape a city steeped in history. A half-pipe of technicolour snakes its way through the verdant Mount Trebevic, once an Olympic bobsled route -- now layered in ever-changing art. "It's a really good place for artists to come here to paint, because you can paint here freely," Kerim Musanovic told AFP, spraycan in hand as he repaired his work on the former site of the 1984 Sarajevo Games. Retouching his mural of a dragon, his painting's gallery is this street art hotspot between the pines. Like most of his work, he paints the fantastic, as far removed from the divisive political slogans that stain walls elsewhere in the Balkan nation. "I want to be like a positive view. When you see my murals or my artworks, I don't want people to think too much about it. "It's for everyone." During the Bosnian war, 1992-1995, Sarajevo endured the longest siege in modern conflict, as Bosnian Serb forces encircled and bombarded the city for 44 months. Attacks on the city left over 11,500 people dead, injured 50,000 and forced tens of thousands to flee. But in the wake of a difficult peace, that divided the country into two autonomous entities, Bosnia's economy continues to struggle leaving the physical scars of war still evident around the city almost three decades on. "After the war, segregation, politics, and nationalism were very strong, but graffiti and hip-hop broke down all those walls and built new bridges between generations," local muralist Adnan Hamidovic, also known as rapper Frenkie, said. Frenkie vividly remembers being caught by police early in his career, while tagging trains bound for Croatia in the northwest Bosnian town of Tuzla. The 43-year-old said the situation was still tense then, with police suspecting he was doing "something political". For the young artist, only one thing mattered: "Making the city your own". Graffiti was a part of Sarajevo life even during the war, from signs warning of sniper fire to a bulletproof barrier emblazoned with the words "Pink Floyd" -- a nod to the band's 1979 album The Wall. Sarajevo Roses -- fatal mortar impact craters filled with red resin -- remain on pavements and roads around the city as a memorial to those killed in the strikes. When he was young, Frenkie said the thrill of illegally painting gripped him, but it soon became "a form of therapy" combined with a desire to do something significant in a country still recovering from war. "Sarajevo, after the war, you can imagine, it was a very, very dark place," he said at Manifesto gallery where he exhibited earlier this year. "Graffiti brought life into the city and also colour." Sarajevo's annual Fasada festival, first launched in 2021, has helped promote the city's muralists while also repairing buildings, according to artist and founder Benjamin Cengic. "We look for overlooked neighbourhoods, rundown facades," Cengic said. His team fixes the buildings that will also act as the festival's canvas, sometimes installing insulation and preserving badly damaged homes in the area. The aim is to "really work on creating bonds between local people, between artists". Mostar, a city in southern Bosnia, will also host the 14th edition of its annual street art festival in August. With unemployment nearing 30 percent in Bosnia, street art also offers an important springboard to young artists, University of Sarajevo sociology professor Sarina Bakic said. "The social context for young people is very difficult," Bakic said. Ljiljana Radosevic, a researcher at Finland's Jyvaskyla University, said graffiti allowed youth to shake off any "nationalist narrative or imposed identity". "It's a way of resisting," Radosevic said. When he was young, Frenkie said the thrill of illegally painting gripped him, but it soon became "a form of therapy" in a country recovering from war AFP
The Herald Scotland
18-07-2025
- General
- The Herald Scotland
The Glasgow-based artist that's inspired by 'mudlarking'
'Mum and I would scour beaches looking for curios, such as fragments of pottery, shells, and particularly sea glass. My mother also had a knack for uncovering historic rubbish dumps and instilled in me this love of looking and finding – I like to call it slow meditative scouring,' says Katie. The family moved to Glasgow when Katie was 17 and having long aspired to go to Glasgow School of Art, she undertook a degree course in Sculpture and Environmental Art and graduated in 2017 with First Class Honours in Sculpture. 'When I was in third year GSA acquired a kiln – and I quickly became hooked on clay and its endless possibilities. After graduating, my dad and I built my garden studio and Manifesto was born. 'The name represents a groundwork for new ideas and action, prompting connections with like-minded people,' she adds. Her work has to date been exhibited at The Royal Scottish Academy and The Ingram Collection in London. Katie's inspiration comes primarily from the landscape around her studio or on visits to beaches where she mudlarks for anything from ancient artefacts to sea creatures, fossils, stones, shells, feathers, and general flotsam and jetsam. (Image: Katie Rose Johnston) 'So many things – above and below ground – inspire me, and I love having a free rein to play with clay and see where it takes me and what come out of it.' The problem with being a mudlarker and gatherer of curious objects is what to do with them. Many people keep beach finds in a glass jar, but Katie has a more artistic solution she calls Curiosity Clouds: the cloud being a unique sculptural form made up of numerous niches, each one serving as a tiny shelf upon which to display a foraged find. The catalyst for these Curiosity Clouds, came from a visit to Glasgow's Hunterian Museum, where in amongst a display case of insect and bird nests from around the world, Katie spotted a cross-section of a termite mound, which exposed an elaborate network of tunnels and compartments termites use for ventilation and navigation. Working from the centre outward using terracotta crank clay, each of Katie's Curiosity Clouds (priced from £200 up to £500) has its own unique appearance and size and is coated in slip to achieve a variety of earthy hues. 'Arranging found curios in each compartment is a return to childhood playdays, carefully placing each exhibit in its new space, like a curator in a museum,' she says. Mycelium candleholders are another eye-catching fusion of form and function. (Image: Katie Rose Johnston) Inspired by the complex system of roots that connect fungi together deep underground, each individual candleholder encases slender taper candles within an ethereal nest of coils made from terracotta clay with a white slip finish. These range in price from £400 up to £1,200. Manifesto's range is expansive and includes a recent exploration into tableware following a six-week Anagama firing residency at Shiro Oni Studios in the Gunma prefecture in Japan, which culminated in an exhibition of functional tableware mimicking the shapes of petals and leaves, also a series of ceramic platters, dishes and bowls, pinched from balls of dark red clay. Katie's ceramics can be purchased from Bard in Leith ( and periodically direct from her workshop in the southside of Glasgow.
Yahoo
12-06-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
German defence minister arrives in Kyiv to discuss support for Ukraine's Armed Forces
German Defence Minister Boris Pistorius arrived in Kyiv on 12 June to discuss further military aid to Ukraine with representatives of the Ukrainian government. Source: European Pravda, citing German TV news service Tagesschau Details: On the morning of 12 June, Pistorius arrived in Kyiv to discuss further military aid to Ukraine with its government officials. "We are doing everything we can to support Ukraine so that it can defend itself and get into a position where Russia is ready for serious negotiations," the German defence minister said. German TV news channel Welt reports that upon his arrival in Kyiv, the German defence minister condemned the intensified Russian airstrikes on Ukraine, which he described as "extremely brutal and threatening, with a large number of cruise missiles and drone attacks". "This is a clear signal from Moscow: there is currently no interest in a peaceful solution; instead, the strikes continue with unabated cruelty and, above all, are increasingly targeting civilian areas of Ukraine," Pistorius said at the railway station in Kyiv. Background: Notably, the visit comes after a document signed by more than 100 figures associated with the Social Democratic Party sparked significant controversy in Germany. It concerns changes in security and defence policy and negotiations with Russia. In the document, entitled "Manifesto", the "peace circles of the SPD" call for negotiations with Russia and an end to the deployment of new US medium-range missiles in Germany. Pistorius has said that the authors of the "Manifesto" are denying reality in their pursuit of peace. Support Ukrainska Pravda on Patreon!
