Created in Serbia over three years, Familiar Characters is a photographic series depicting the odyssey of a grown-up revisiting childhood. Life away from home allowed me to see my upbringing from a distance and more objectively. Despite historical currents which I could only sense but not comprehend as a child, I developed a deep sentiment towards my childhood that I cherish to this day. I realized that both the physical and immaterial remains of my formative years represent a mirror of the culture that shaped significant parts of my identity. This made me want to better understand my fascination with childhood and its aesthetics.
In that process, I became a little kid again, playing with toys and making imaginary kingdoms. Soon enough, memories acquired a strange appeal as I was gathering a wider picture of events that took place in my early years. Growing up in the aftermath of war didn’t stop me from finding joy, as my family made sure to preserve and protect the image of a happy childhood for me. I returned to the uncanny places of my hometown and found myself in the old family house and the landscapes surrounding it. I started filling them with familiar characters in the hope of saving a naive memory of childhood by painting it over with vivid colours. The uncanny feeling prevailed as this adventure of an adult revisiting childhood took a strange turn, making me both its host and visitor. The boundaries between past and present or memory and fact became blurred and insignificant. My world became one big playground, a field for building new memories and fantasies.
The innocence of childhood dreams that got distorted by the reality of an adult world made my sentiment almost synonymous with a lucid dream. A sense of displacement saturates this odyssey, evoking a yearning for a feeling of belonging and freedom. I tried to portray how these longings shaped my memory and imagination, which serve as a shelter in times of uncertainty, offering hope and perseverance. Familiar Characters developed into a personal mythology that is not only an exploration of my childhood and its memories but a broader reflection on human nature and our need to return to and preserve our sacred (inner) places.