One of the most significant written documents in which texts were published about the importance of culture as a form of resistance during the siege of Sarajevo is the Cultural Survival Newsletter (bulletin on the cultural survival of the city under siege) produced by FAMA. It is a unique chronicle and analysis of cultural and intellectual life in Sarajevo during the siege. The newsletter had four editions, one of which was published in the winter of 1993, and the other three in 1994. All were printed in Zagreb. The Newsletter was printed on A3 format.

FAMA Collection: Cultural Survival Newsletter, Nr. 1, Spring 1994

The Cultural Survival Newsletter is the first printed publication to mention and elaborate on the concept of cultural survival in Sarajevo under siege. Part of each issue was a report on cultural events in Sarajevo that were realized in impossible conditions. FAMA's Newsletter can today serve as authentic written evidence of how the citizens of Sarajevo during the siege resisted terror and the attempt to destroy all the values that they had previously lived by and that they wanted to preserve through their actions.

In the so-called "issue zero", which came out at the end of 1993, had the following text published on the front page:

Sarajevo is a unique city on the planet. It is the site where our civilization has been dismantled in the course of intentional violence.

But Sarajevo is also the symbol of civil defense, the site where violence has been fought back with tolerance, fascism with arts and culture, destruction with rebuilding, death with humor, the outburst of rural culture with the one that’s urbane, terror with stubborn maintaining of normal city lifestyle.

Sarajevo has been deprived of all the civil, existential and social rights. It has been deprived of the right to live. Everything that makes normal (urbane) living has been taken away from Sarajevo and its citizens, everything that could have been taken away has been taken away, all except for the right to survive by maintaining the right to culture.

But among all that destruction and dying – kids are being born, birthdays celebrated, weddings carried out. In the city surrounded by the deadly circle of primitivism the exhibitions are being opened, movies made, festivals organized, theatre plays and musicals performed.

Sarajevo lives the post-cataclysm. It is the picture of civilization emerging out of cataclysm, making something out of nothing, giving messages for the future. Not because the future is necessarily a future of wars and disasters, but because humans are growing older and being born into a world which is ever less secure. All that has been left under the ruins of Sarajevo, all that has survived the shelling of our civilization is the spirit of the cultural survival. The reconstruction of that spirit, the spirit of Sarajevo must start – now. Otherwise – Sarajevo will become the graveyard of the principles of multi-ethnicity and human rights.

©️ FAMA Collection - 'Baby Universe' Festival 1994, flyer design: Emir Kasumagić

Accompanying posters were designed and printed for exhibitions, concerts, theatre performances and other cultural events held during the siege, some of which are stored in the FAMA collection. And they bear witness to the strength of the spirit of the citizens of Sarajevo who did not even have basic resources for survival, but who still tried to find the means to print such materials.

This is how the posters for the "BABY UNIVERSE" Festival were created, which are the work of designer Emir Kasumagić. Under impossible conditions, in 1994, the festival managed to organize and set up 15 different events throughout the city. It hosted and presented the works of local and international artists, professors, journalists, intellectuals, actors, musicians, and directors. Their works and talent are presented through a series of public events, exhibitions, performances, concerts, literary evenings, library events, theatre performances, and academic lectures (among others by professors Robert Donia and John Fine) - through a mobile university. The project was organized by the Sarajevo International Film and Theatre Festival (MES), in co-production with FAMA.

During the siege, postcards produced by the design group "Trio" were created, which conveyed messages about life, survival, spirit and optimism around the world. During the siege, the postcards were, among other things, shown at the "Survival Art Museum" exhibition, which was held in 1994 as part of the "BABY UNIVERSUM" festival.

Advice for survival

"We prepared a kind of message from Sarajevo to the world, to the outside world. We created a little work of art through postcards. Postcard after postcard, message after message, which we wanted to send to the outside world using symbols known throughout the world such as Coca-Cola, Hollywood, man on the moon, Marilyn Monroe, symbols that can be easily communicated to the world. And we put these symbols into a Sarajevan context. We wanted to send the messages to our friends. There were about thirty or forty messages that we created one after the other over a period of seven days. And then we held an exhibition for the tenth anniversary of the Sarajevo Olympics. That show consisted of those 40 messages, presented as big posters. It was a lot of trouble to make those posters because there were no more, I don’t know, tempera paints. We had to get them from some kids, since we were already more than a year into the war. It was terribly cold at the Collegium Artisticum, where we did all of the work. We even wrote a little note on the postcards showing that they were printed under wartime conditions. We wrote: No electricity, no water, and no gas. Just good will. It was kind of like our document that was also a piece of art. In addition, the preparations for printing out a small series of let’s say 100 copies sometimes lasted for two or three months. Sometimes we had to trade cigarettes for paper, or buy something in return for paint, and then have to wait for there to be water so that the printers could clean the presses, set them up, and so on. You constantly had the impression that five or six people were risking their lives just in order to print a set of postcards that you wanted to be a record of that moment. The opening was on the tenth anniversary of the Sarajevo Olympics. About one hundred people gathered there. They had to risk crossing the bridge to Skenderija. We constructed a big installation made out of empty Coca-Cola crates, which were supposed to remind people of our message, ‘Enjoy Sarajevo’. Which expressed the idea that however you look at it, we still enjoy Sarajevo, our city." - Bojan Hadžihalilović, Designer

FAMA Collection, Sarajevo “ LIFE” Magazine (1995)

During the siege, more precisely in 1995, FAMA produced a special edition called "Sarajevo LIFE Magazine". The project used as inspiration and framework the original concept and design of the American "LIFE" magazine, which always revealed things unknown and distant. Sarajevo's LIFE was published as a special edition that reveals for others in the world, through interviews and photographs, what the people of Sarajevo under siege think about eternal and humanistic topics important to humanity. 87 individuals of different profiles, artists, academics, sociologists, actors, architects, designers, intellectuals, and journalists taught us about hope, work, art, survival, fear in a city under siege.

FAMA Collection, Sarajevo “LIFE” Magazine

The original form of LIFE magazine was adapted to the new reality and packaged as an anthropological, cultural and sociological study of the siege phenomenon. The magazine also contains special sections on cultural survival: fashion, theatre, a survival art museum and manga-style comics. The edition had 130 pages. The magazine Sarajevo LIFE was not printed in Bosnian, but it was translated and its adapted translation can be found in the book "Encyclopaedia: Siege of Sarajevo 1992-1996".

"There is the senselessness of drawing comic books and the desire to express yourself, not to go crazy"

Dragan Rokvić

musician, illustrator, comic artist

Photo: Dragan Rokvić - Now (personal archives) and then (personal archives, 1993)

The comic book you finished in 1994 was published in the FAMA Collection, in SARAJEVO LIFE Magazine. The title of the comic is "Hamsun's Baedeker", and its basis is an essay of the same name by Bora Ćosić, who wrote it in 1993 during his exile in Rome. Can you remember when and how the idea for this comic book came about?

Dragan Rokvić: The idea for the comic book came from Suada Kapić, who invited me for a conversation, presented the idea, and left me the freedom to create a script or concept based on which the comic book would be made. I had this story from Bora Ćosić, which at the time, at 24 years old and half-crazy from the war events, I understood very little, but I felt it more, so I was guided by feeling and intuition, or rather the inspiration that guided me.

The idea for the comic book came from Suada Kapić, who invited me for a conversation, presented the idea, and left me the freedom to create a script or concept based on which the comic book would be made. I had this story from Bora Ćosić, which at the time, at 24 years old and half-crazy from the war events, I understood very little, but I felt it more.

In your comic book, scenes from Ćosić's essay and scenes from Sarajevo under siege are intertwined. Ćosić uses the name of Karl Baedeker, the publisher of famous German tourist guides, as a metaphor for the title of the essay, and in Sarajevo, under siege, work is being done on the guide "The Art of Survival" (FAMA production). You took that concept for your comic book? How long did you work on it - from concept to final work? What did the everyday process of drawing comic books look like in wartime conditions?

Dragan Rokvić: I had no idea who Baedeker was, I had FAMA's "Survival Guide" and that story by Bora Ćosić, as inspiration, that is, an instruction on what the comic book should be about. The story mentioned a girl who, as a character, was my guide through the Sarajevo part of the story. Now I remember, when you mentioned the Guide, and when I saw the comic book again after 30 years, that I used the photos from the FAMA survival guide, for example, when those people are sawing the trunk on the grave. I think I drew the comic book very quickly, in a few days, I'm usually a very fast draftsman, and especially then in my twenties, I delivered drawings in an incredibly short time. Of course, that has pros and cons, the quality suffers, but the customers are satisfied. It's not a joke, I'm aware of the shortcomings that arise from such speed, but on the other hand, energy is retained with such a way of working and if you have charm and style, it comes to the fore, so a lot can be forgiven. The daily process then was according to the work system as it would look like in peacetime conditions, except that stress and adrenaline were extreme. At the same time, you have the senselessness of drawing comics and the desire to draw, not only to make money, but also to express yourself and not go crazy. From this distance of time, it seems almost appealing.

The daily process then was according to the work system as it would look like in peacetime conditions, except that stress and adrenaline were extreme. At the same time, you have the senselessness of drawing comics and the desire to draw, not only to make money, but also to express yourself and not go crazy. From this distance of time, it seems almost appealing.

What else did you do during the siege of Sarajevo? We know that you are a musician, illustrator, comic artist... Can you remember other creative projects that you realized during the siege? Did you do any other comic books during that period? Did you play music during the siege of the city?

Dragan Rokvić: I did all that, a lot. I listened to music whenever I could and played, wrote songs, wrote stories. Professionally, or for money, I mostly drew comics. My friend Karim Zaimović, who unfortunately died right before the end of the war, acquired comic magazines and albums through all possible channels, so we looked at all these works at his place or at my place and discussed, agreed and disagreed, to put it mildly. Karim was such a source of knowledge, not only from the world of comic books, but also music, literature, and film. There are a huge number of comic artists, writers and musicians that I learned about and loved, thanks to him. Together, we made 30 comic panels "Season without the Devil", a comic book based on his script, which was inspired by "The Master and Margarita" by Bulgakov, as well as the comic series "Sandman" by Neil Gaiman. Unfortunately, we didn't finish it, but what we had was published in instalments in the magazine "Fantom Slobode" (Engl. "The Phantom of Freedom") which was published during 1995. There were a lot of comic strips that I drew, which were printed by magazines and newspapers in Sarajevo at the time. Now that I remember, publications were read and published more during the war than later, and especially today. I haven't considered myself a comic artist for a long time, I no longer have the desire or time. To be a comic artist requires love and time, and other projects and things I do, primarily music, don't leave me much. In the last twenty years or so, I've drawn many comic books, mostly commissioned for projects and only a few because I imagined and wanted to. If I draw, then I draw storyboards that are similar to comics, visually, but without the prison that drawing comics entails, as well as illustrations for books, which I really enjoy.

There were a lot of comic strips that I drew, which were printed by magazines and newspapers in Sarajevo at the time. Now that I remember, publications were read and published more during the war than later, and especially today. I haven't considered myself a comic artist for a long time, I no longer have the desire or time.