I’ve been trying for the last two weeks to put together some sort of introduction to my ongoing project about the destruction of a large Roma camp here in Belgrade, and words have really failed me. I can’t even come up with an original title (this one is hopefully temporary). I have a lot to say about the community I’ve been photographing for four months and how the destruction of their camps was handled, and hopefully I’ll have something coherent to share soon. But I’ve been teasing and working the project too long not to share some of the images here, especially as this first chapter has ended. So you’ll have to wait for some more of the back story and future plans for the project, though I can point you to this news article for some sad details about the exodus, which I am continuing to photograph. Click on any of the images to go to my website which has a small edit of the project.

Sorry for my lack of posting over the last month or so, I’ve been kept very busy with a roadtrip, an assignment in Albania and work on a personal project or two. But I have a lot of little things saved up to post, and will catch up on a few today.

But first I thought I’d share a couple of things from what I’ve been up to. The first of three stories I shot in Albania for the New York Times / International Herald Tribune with Dan Bilefsky, having to do with Sunday’s elections in Albania, has been published: “Albanians, Cut Off, Get Set to Vote”. We have two more stories to go to print in the coming weeks, and I’ll share those and more pictures when I can.

Last, a little peek at a project I’m working on here in Belgrade about Roma communities who are in danger of losing their homes when the city/state redevelops the land that they are squatting on. A lot of issues going on here, and I’ve been trying to unpack it over the last month or so and there is much more to do, this really is in its beginning stages. A little bit further down the line I’ll be able to share more pictures and more of the story. For now, a couple of frames:

Next up are another couple of short trips back to Kosovo and to Bosnia to continue my stories there. I look forward to having more to show you all soon, thanks for having a look!

Matt’s mentioned the book here previously, but if you’re looking for a Boogie fix, Time’s just posted a selection from his new book, Belgrade Belongs to Me. Love this line in one of the cuts: “When Milosevic came to power in 1989, peopole thought he was going to resurrect Serbia to its former glory. It turned out he was just another self-serving Communist bastard.”

Sunday morning (real early) I left cozy Belgrade in the pretty snow for Kosovo. Spent the first 36 hours in Mitrovica and I am now in Prishtina for a couple of days. The first anniversary of Kosovo’s independence is Tuesday. Will probably be here in Prishtina for the festivities…

Big thanks to Giulio Petrocco who let me crash on his couch last night (honestly, the best place I’ve slept in a month). Giulio’s an Italian photographer who is living in North Mitrovica with the Serbs, and he cooks some great pasta.

Will be very busy next few days but will try to write about what is happening here. Probably not too many pictures since we’re trying to publish them ‘for real’ all around… Ciao!

Aye, I have been procrastinating on this post for far too long. I landed in Belgrade a week ago and have been trying to find the words to sum up what this move is all about and what I’m planning. Maybe I’m still figuring it out for myself.

I am currently staying with my friend Jovan of the wonderful XAOC group which we profiled a little bit with an interview with my good friend Djordje Jovanovic. Near the center of Belgrade and a nice flat (minus their fun but overly energetic and yappy dog named MimiNPCRambo), but I’m pining for my own place… unfortunately, finding a decent apartment here at an ok price is hard to do. Patience is called for. Patience is my life right now.

New York ended beautifully with a number of terrific and very encouraging meetings from diverse magazines and agencies, from Vanity Fair to GEO and Getty (and a lucky last-minute ticket to see the Colbert Report tape a show). Hopefully things will come of the solid reviews soon. As I will expand below, there is a lot that I have cooking here in the Balkans and Russia that I am incredibly excited about and I hope I have the chance to fund them and then get them published. DVA will absolutely be a big part of the latter, at least in the short term. I plan to post updates on my stories, travels, assignments and thinking.

This move to the Balkans is both a long time coming and a sudden impulse decision. Back in 2007, when I was on a Balkan study abroad program from the University of Washington, I had a chance to visit a number of cities in the region and then stay on to live and work in Kosovo. From my first few days in Belgrade then, in April 07, I knew that this was a city that was meant for me (like New York). From that moment I knew that I could, and should, move here to pursue my work. I visited again in May/June 2008 and it definitely strengthened this idea … (to utterly rip off my friend Boogie’s phrase, and ironically at that) … I felt that ‘Belgrade Belongs To Me’.

Ultimately there was not enough happening in Seattle for me and it is simply too damn far away from any of the stories I’m really interested in doing right now. Odd, but there really are more work possibilities for me outside of the United States (I see friends moving to the Middle East these days too; the American photographer diaspora?) and hopefully being ‘in a small pond’ will provide me a strong if not lucrative start to my international career. I’ve got a lot of faith, there are dozens of positive signs and I am receiving a lot of support (if only it were the financial kind), so I am very optimistic of success and important pictures. Time will tell, I am and will be forced to remain patient.

I made the decision and bought my ticket (first to New York then to here) about two weeks before I had to leave. Added to the impulse, and hurry, was the last minute decision to go to Washington to cover Obama’s Inauguration. So in a rush I packed up my books, gear and some clothes in Seattle into three bags and hit the plane running; still can’t believe I packed up my life and got away so quickly. Maybe this is the best way to do it, maybe not, but it is working for me. Since moving back to Seattle in the summer of 2007 I’ve been living lightly and without many strings, hoping to be able to get on the road should the opportunity arise. Unfortunately, it really didn’t so with extremely small savings I bought this one way ticket. Now, I’m here trying to find an assignment or two and am prepared to pick up an English teaching job. Yea, wish me luck

The short term plan is to head to Kosovo on Saturday to be part of the first anniversary “festivities” that will happen around the country. On February 17 2008 Kosovo unilaterally declared its independence amidst a strange international reaction and a strong festive and emotive party in the streets. Conventional wisdom amongst journalist friends, Kosovar and international, is that there will be similar actions this coming week, and maybe some stronger Serb reactions in Mitrovica and Serbia proper. No strong rumors yet to anything ‘big’ happening but it is a nice story and probably a very good follow-up chapter in my ongoing work there. It seems the world will be watching (i.e. publications will be interested) so I am quite hopeful to sell a couple of pictures. My agents (Invision and Grazia Neri) are also very enthused about the story and have told me that European editors are responding very favorably to my portfolios so who knows. Work soon, I hope.

Longer term I will be visiting Moldova and the Ukraine for the start of a series of projects on Russia’s influence in flux, centered around the energy economy. After, I hope to find a way to fund some trips across Russia where I have dozens of story ideas, including my dream project in Eastern Siberia, which I’ve mentioned obliquely before. Until I secure funding I still won’t describe what it is But this is the month when I will hear from 4 or 5 grants and if luck will have it I’ll be there working by Fall.

More soon I hope, this time with new real pictures. Haven’t shot anything at all since I’ve been here except these pictures of the snowstorm at dusk today, too much work getting situated and recovering from the crazy push through New York. There have been some requests to describe that process of getting and preparing for meetings with NYC editors and hopefully I’ll get something together on that too. Cheers to all, friends and colleagues. For now from snowy Belgrade, the white city, M.

Sorry about the distinct slacking of posting here on Dva in the last week or two by both M. Scott and myself. He is on the road in China without easy access to the internet (not to mention he is better out shooting rather than blogging anyways) and I am in full-on crisis mode getting ready for a major change in my life. On January 16 I am leaving Seattle for New York and DC, to cover the inauguration and field meetings with all of the fine editors in the City, before heading to my new home of Belgrade in the first week of February. I have much more to share about this trip and this relocation, and I’ll be sure to write more here in the coming weeks, but first I must take care of all the massive to-do lists I have lying around… I’m sure you can understand.

Also stressful: Why is January 15th the deadline for all of the photo contests, grant and proposals I have on my calendar? As you can see on our Dvafoto Deadline Calendar (helpfully listed on the bottom-right corner of the site and available as a feed to go straight in to your calendar software) there is a lot coming due including POYi, World Press Photo, Days Japan and Px3 Paris. Get on your contest horse everyone and good luck! We’ll chat soon again.

(Oh, and if you are in New York or DC, or Belgrade/Prishtina, and want to meet up when I swing through I’d love to meet some of our readers. Especially if you’re an editor! Get in touch via email or the comments.)

Boogie, a Serbian photographer who emigrated to New York in 1998, publishes his third book with PowerHouse Books (first was It’s All Good followed by the exclusive slipcover Boogie), this time directed at his first home: Belgrade.

If you’ve read this blog at at all, you know of my love and connection to Serbia and the Balkans, and it should come as no surprise that I am ecstatic to see this book come to life. I was with Boogie last spring in New York, when this project was still coming together, and we shared many memories and troubles about the city we both love (often in sick ways). He was kind enough to answer some questions about this book and his work:

why this book now?
it’s been in the making for years, in a way I’m paying respect to my city.
what are your feelings about your belgrade pictures?
some of them I took many years ago, some are pretty new – but in general, it’s hard for me to edit my own images, I’m so used to looking at them, and it’s very hard to be objective. When people see my Belgrade book they are pretty struck by how grim it all looks, but that’s the way I see it. I love my city, it made me who I am, but it’s pretty dark.
seeing that they are from your hometown, do they have a different meaning or depth for you than your work in other parts of the world?
of course, it’s much more personal this time. and the whole editing/writing process was very emotional for me, cause it brought back memories, both good and bad.
why do you do books?
to leave something behind + they help me remember all the things I’ve seen

you can also find Belgrade Belongs To Me on Amazon. Support your favorite photographers: buy their work.

Yesterday morning I saw a post on the Magnum Blog by nominee Peter van Agtmael, with some pictures he took out the window of buses in Africa. It immediately brought to mind my endless hours on the roads and rails of the Balkans and Eastern Europe. As it turns out, I’ve taken many more pictures from the train trips I’ve taken than the buses (probably because I was concentrating on sleeping and/or not getting sick while riding the buses), and I thus was inspired to dig through my archive (strange trips down the memory lane) and pull out some of those pictures that otherwise would not have seen the light of day. One of the original goals of the original incarnation of Dvafoto was for Scott and I to have an outlet for the pictures that we wouldn’t publish anywhere else.. the outtakes, the near-misses. So here I present a new set of images from the last couple of years on the rails. And sorry I don’t have, at this moment, any stories to tell from these pictures (like Peter)… I am rather exhausted from hours spent digging through harddrives… hopefully soon.

[caption id="attachment_774" align="aligncenter" width="600" caption="Between Sarajevo and Mostar, Bosnia and Herzegovina. May 2007."][/caption]








If you pester me, maybe I can tell you about the 28hour trip I took from Moldova to Kiev with gallons of smuggled wine (not mine of course) hidden in the panels above my bunk in the ancient Moldovan train car, with two young Russian-Moldovan minors watching over my car with the bought conductor. It was a good time, actually, sharing dvds and me getting to practice my Russian. Thankfully the Ukrainian customs weren’t too thorough…

I’m very pleased to introduce you all to my friend, and source of inspiration, Djordje Jovanovic of Belgrade. I met him and his ‘crew’ in 2007 while studying abroad in the Balkans and from the very first beer we had I knew he was a special one. And not only because we had the very same taste in photographers and ideas on what photography should and can be, but because of his passion and ideas for how to push things forward in the otherwise stifling society of post-conflict, post-communist ex-Yugoslavia. Though he has recently put photography aside (makes me sad.. look at this work!) to pursue innovative and ground-breaking projects with his company XAOC Creative (the Serbian word, in Cyrillic, for Chaos) he still edits, designs and publishes the amazing XAOC Magazine, which has introduced me to countless interesting photographers from around the world. He was even so kind as to feature M. Scott in Issue 3 and Me in Issue 2. If you click on no other links for this post, check out these magazines.

Tell me a little about your city and your country
Belgrade is the capital of a small European country – Serbia. Serbia, in a recent history, was part of a larger country – a communist Yugoslavia. Now the country is in a process of transition and European integration. There are ongoing reforms in almost all state and social sectors . Belgrade is a vibrant city that has a tendency towards a group violence every few months. Interesting and loved city by many westerners and locals… known for cheep drinks, friendly people and beautiful girls ) bla bla
 
What did you go to school for?
I went to a High school for design – graphic design department, and just got my degree in computer arts and design at the academy of arts BK in Belgrade.

How did you decide to pursue this?
I really don’t remember but I guess that I like to draw when I was a kid and being a son of a photographer kind of pushed me into it… and I liked it.
 
What are you doing now?
Now I’m working on a creative and administrative processes in a company called Xaoc Creative that I started a year ago with two friends. Essentially it’s a creative center dealing with all kinds of visual communication. We’re mostly focused on graphic design for web and print, advanced web development and of course image production.

What changed between school, your first jobs as a photographer and where you are now?
A lot! Everything. My first full time job was in Serbian national news agency Tanjug. I was a kid just finished high school that suddenly was attending all the government and parliament sessions and traveling around the country and region with all the heads of state. It had a big impact on my process of thinking. Later on I started to work for Kurir daily newspaper simultaneously while working for Tanjug and studying. That brought even more fun to my life. Kurir is a tabloid, something like The sun in UK, so I was now in a even wider company of people, including entertainment and sport stars, criminals and a lot of very diverse ordinary folks with big problems. It was very interesting period, parliament session in the morning, gypsy settlement in poverty on the afternoon and VIP fashion show/party in the evening… that’s how my days looked like. . Later on I switched to Gazeta news paper and later to Hello! Magazine. During this four year period I was mainly interested in documentary photography. But I realized that photography is not enough for me anymore in terms of expression and impact. So I decided to start a company and put some more media in, some more people and more serious projects.
 
What did you enjoy about working as a photojournalist?
Process of creation was most enjoyable compared to the same process in other media. It was fast, simple and powerful.
Then of course the interaction with people and places that I was able to have working as a photojournalist.
“Photographing because I want to change the world and help people in need” is the line that we can hear from many big names in this business but I think it’s a big lie. I seriously doubt that anyone is photographing with that goal in mind.

Why did you leave photography?
Photography just don’t have big impact on society anymore. At least I think so. I wanted something with much bigger impact and that’s why we’re working with more media now. Also I wanted more control and more freedom and I felt that I could contribute more than I could as a photojournalist.
 

Tell me about Xaoc and your team.
Core team consist of tree man. Marko Kecman (Ed- Another terrific photographer and friend of mine.. check xaocphoto.com), Jovan Damjanovic and myself. We also have two developers, and two men that are dealing with photo production and a lot of contributors.

What kind of work are you doing?
A lot of web and print projects. In image production we are doing everything that a newspaper or a magazine would like us to do in a BtoB model. Fashion editorials, Products, reportages, interviews, campaigns… whatever you can think of… (Ed- Have a look at this project XAOC has done called Victims! of Serbian Politics. It combines nifty design, terrific photography and a social motive in an interesting and engaging way.)

Tell me about Xaoc Magazine. Who do you feature?
Xaoc magazine is a noncommercial free time project that has a potential for growth. We weren’t satisfied with the photo scene in Serbia so we felt the need to do something about it. Web magazine was the easiest way to do it… we’ve done only three issues for now, but had a nice feedback from people all over the world. Selection is based upon the aesthetics that we find interesting and that cant be found in a media scene in Belgrade… not in a mainstream at least. It’s internationally orientated but we always put at least one Serbian photographer in it.

What is the media scene in Serbia?
Rich and expanding. Quality I want comment on.
 
What kind of relationship do you have with the rest of the region (Balkans) and Europe?
Rich and expanding. Yes we do have a big problem here with visas, but we’re managing to overcome it. Other than that it’s fine. Balkans and Europe are rich in war history but I don’t find it to be an issue.
 
What are your goals for Xaoc? For yourself?
To expand our business internationally is the first next step. On a long run we want to contribute to an ongoing evolution for a better society. We’re living in a very interesting time now and not just in a last few decades or centuries but form the beginning of a mankind. We believe that humans are soon to evolve into much more powerful and peaceful beings and with great anticipation are looking into the future.
 
Any predictions for the Serbian, Balkan and worldwide media scenes?
For a serious answer a serious analysis is necessary but I’m not worried. I think that things are going In a positive direction and that we’re going to enjoy much richer and better media in the future.

Any links we need to see?
X Geek – Stuff you don’t know and Serbian photographer in New York Boogie. (ed- he is also the cover story in XAOC Magazine #2)

On a personal note, I cannot wait to be back in Belgrade; Djordje and the other guys from Xaoc know how to have a good time and still get up the next morning and work your butt off. And, I’ve just got to say, that opening picture is simply one of my favorite pictures from anyone anywhere.