As part of the documentary series “The Story Behind The Photo”, the fourth episode was released, which tells the story of the photograph of a murdered boy from Sarajevo, Nermin Divovic, on this day in 1994 in Sarajevo, which was taken by Spanish Associated Press photojournalist Enric Marti.
The documentary series is an integral part of “Sniper Alley Photo”, the author’s project of Sarajevo artist Dzemil Hodzic, launched in 2019. It is a series of mini-documentaries and poignant testimonies in which foreign photojournalists, who stayed in besieged Sarajevo, talk about how they took those photographs.
So far, Enrico Dagnino, Thomas Haley, and Christopher Morris have talked about their photos, and in the fourth episode, Associated Press Spanish photojournalist Enric Marti talks about the photo of the murdered Nermin Divovic.
Nermin Divovic would have turned 36 this year in October, but that dream was cut short on November 18th, 1994, when an Army of Republika Srpska (VRS) sniper killed him from the direction of Grbavica. There was a truce in those days and Nermin was walking with his mother and sister between the National Museum and the Faculty of Philosophy. The same bullet hit his mother Dzenana Sokolovic in the stomach. The shot went through her gut and hit Nermin in the temple. She was pregnant at that time and her two children were killed in one day. Nermin was left dead on the spot, and the Spanish Associated Press photojournalist Enric Marti, who was nearby, photographed a moment that will forever be recorded in history. That moment when Nermin lies in a pool of blood.
Enric tries to describe that day and give some details related to the creation of the photograph.
“You see when you live in Sarajevo, you cannot be neutral. You are in Sarajevo and you see what is happening to the people in Sarajevo. And then, like us… You go by car to Pale to buy gas or something else. And then you see the Serb’s position on the hills looking and seeing the streets and people, seeing everything. How can you be neutral? They have people up on the hill killing these people below. The good guys are down there and the bad guys are up in the hills. That’s it. So, are you objective? Are you neutral? No, you’re not. You take a side just by being there. But it’s good to ask yourself about the reasons why things happen,” Marti says in the interview and adds:
“The people who lived in Sarajevo from 1992 to 1995 had much more traumatic experiences than I. After all, I came here and chose to be here, regardless of the reasons. But I chose it. The child who was born here and who had to live through shelling and the rest did not choose it and has much more trauma than me.”
Dzemil Hodzic, the author of the “Sniper Alley Photo” project, points out that the culture of memory is an integral part of the project and this short film is only a small part of their work. He especially emphasized and expressed his gratitude to the people who supported their campaign and donated funds.
He added that the list of people who helped the project is too long and that he would not want to skip someone, but if he had to single out one person, it would be Emir Jordamovic, the director of photography, without whom, as he says, the realization of the film would hardly be possible.
“The film was made out of love for the late Nermin, for our city, and the composition at the end is some kind of a tribute to all of us. That it should never be forgotten, that it should never happen again,” concludes Hodzic, Federalna reports.
Photo: Gervasio Sanchez
