'nolongerland'

‘nolongerlans’ is a story, a project Goran embraced himself with in order to understand roots of his upbringing, the country, its culture that is no longer, the country of a very diverse, conflicting and misunderstood history, Yugoslavia. A founded Kingdom, turned a Socialist experiment, ended with a short-lived Parliamentary Democracy, Yugoslavia was the root of his identity.

Goran consider himself Yugoslavian, an entity non-existent yet ingrained so firmly in within his identity that the only way he had been able to grapple with its demise, deconstruction was to search for a new, alien identity only an immigrant can have; the world in within, “ni na nebu ni na tlu.” (In the Middle of Nowhere), neither here or there, nowhere, nolongerland…

Goran is doing self-portraiture in the images of people, very important historical players who had influenced the country he is from and doing so influenced himself. From the King of Yugoslavia and the early Serbian, Croat or Sloven parliamentarians, to Tito, partisans, Communists, Socialism, ending with poets, writers, philosopher, philologist who in the early 19 century were part of a turbulent times in Europe, the times of creating national states. He was hoping that some deeper knowledge, understanding could be grasped by posing as those characters, looking himself into mirror being someone else, as any constructed identity actually is. Doing so he hoped to grasp the stamina, strength of those who in these tremulous times were striving for something idealized, better regardless of its ultimate failure or not, depending whom he talks to, into another, new, construction he could not identify himself with, choosing instead to roam these worlds never finding home, world, becoming a wanderer…

After his journey into the past reflecting into the present, Goran understood and have found peace in truth that he is a member of South Slav tribes, Yugoslav.

…a large brain bipedal animal extinct, Yugoslavian.