BOSNIA AND HERZEGOVINA

Text by Antonio Mendoza, movie by Timur Makarevic

In Mostar we worked at the OKC Abracevic Youth Center. This facility had been a community center for over 80 years, but it was destroyed during the war. After the war it was reclaimed by a group of activists who recently were awarded the legal ownership of the compound. The center itself consists of about three buildings, two of which are in ruins. There are about 15 containers on the rooftop and stacked around the property that have been turned into offices, a radio station, a media room and other work spaces. For five days two of the containers were turned into the MY HERO / GLOBAL EXCHANGE production offices/editing suite.

The OKC Abrasevic Youth Center is located (physically and philosophically) in the buffer zone that divides the city. OKC Abrasevic promotes an Ethical Code of conduct "encouraging dialogue between the various ethnic and religious groups in Mostar to heal the current state of intolerance and social segregation."

Timur, our Site Administrator in Bosnia & Herzegovina, thought Mostar would be a great place to hold our workshops. If anyone needs to build bridges, the citizens of Mostar are clearly the ones. Symbolically, the Stari Most, a bridge in Mostar considered to be one of the oldest in Europe, was destroyed during the war, and then rebuilt in 2000 by Unesco. Though the Stari Most is back and better than ever, other psychological bridges remain in dire need of repair.

The participants in the MY HERO / GLOBAL EXCHANGE Workshops in Mostar were mostly artists, activists and students with some media training. Unlike our other Site Administrators, Timur's background is in media production, so he had line-produced three distinct projects prior to our arrival. One of the more successful projects produced during the workshops was about Valentina Mindoljevic, a physics teacher at the Gimnazija Mostar (Mostar High School). As a little girl Valentina dreamed of becoming an astronaut and teacher. Every year she and her students celebrate space exploration by having a science fair that includes a water-propelled rocket competition. Another movie was about Nedim Cisic, a local musician and OKC Abrasevic regular, who talked about the creative process. Nedim also lent his music to two of the other videos made in Mostar.

On our last night in Mostar we held a screening of the videos produced in Mostar, as well as several award-winning videos from the 2006 MY HERO Film Festival and the U.S. EXPRESS Anthology. Valentina and Nemic and the other people featured in the videos were present. After the show our friends in Mostar were clearly empowered by what they had achieved with their videos. The MY HERO / GLOBAL EXCHANGE team hopes to return to OKC Abrasevic to bring more support and equipment to this wonderful community youth center.

It was great to return to Mostar. OKC Abrasevic. is a lively center that attracts lots of diverse activity. Though at times it can be chaotic (and overbooked), it remains a great place to work. It's a very creative environment and its spirit clearly rubbed off on the projects we produced there. On the first day of the 2008 MY HERO / GLOBAL EXCHANGE Workshops, we screened Emina and Goran video, Valentina Mindoljevic, winner of the 2007 My Hero Film Festival Filmmaker Category Award.

We held an award ceremony to give Emina and Goran their certificates and their prize. In a separate ceremony in Valentina's home (she had bronchitis and was unable to participate in the workshops), we gave Valentina a Special Hero Award from the 2007 My Hero Film Festival.

Prior to our visit, Timur and Marija Kolobaric had pre-produced several stories and discussed them with the group before we arrived. Huso Orucevic, the OKC Abrasevic's Media Editor, suggested four of the stories. Three high school art students (Denis Kapetanovic, Anja Peric and Andrea Anicic), a college student (Anina Sator), and an American Princeton-educated volunteer worker (Katie Hampton) attended the workshops.

Anina and Katie produced OKC Abrasevic, an accurate portrait of the center illustrating its importance as a cultural bridge in Mostar. Marija Kolobaric, our Mostar workshop administrator and one of the managers of Abrasevic, made Tradition, a nportrait about a local artisan who works in the old part of town near the bridge. High School art students Anja Peric and Andrea Anicic made Flying Man, a portrait of a hang-glider. Marathon Runner, produced by Denis Kapetanovic and Sanita Isovic, is a powerful portrait of a marathon runner who does 100 Kilometer-runs after nearly losing his leg in a motorcycle accident. Timur produced an excellent piece, Diver and the Bridge, about a jumper at the Stari Most.

It is telling that the Stari Most was featured in several projects. Clearly, it's a symbol for many in Mostar of how the two sides of the city must find a way to integrate and coexist.

On the final night in Mostar we hosted a screening of the projects at the OKC Abrasevic clubroom. The audience included Tina, Marija, Anina and Huso from OKC Abrasevic, as well as the Flying Man and the Bridge Diver.