Dubrovnik is not only the location of the original story that inspired this project, but also my second hometown where I spent summer holidays at my grandmother’s as a child. I have a love-hate relationship to the place; my childhood connection, a fascination with its beauty, family ties and ambivalence about its history. A few years ago, I heard the story about two girls going to pick asparagus on Petka Hill and never returning home. The next day they were found; one dead, the other alive. The surviving girl never said what had happened that day. The dead girl’s father thinks it was murder. The police shelved the case. Many of Dubrovnik’s inhabitants never heard the story. In 1993, shortly after the war in Croatia, many were still living in countries like Italy, Switzerland or the US, where they had found shelter during the bombing of the town. What really happened that spring day? As I tried to find out more about the incident, the story kept shifting, its narrators adding or changing details. I was increasingly drawn into the dark universe of Dubrovnik and its everyday life; dominant women, missing men, fragile relationships, jealousy and love. I started to wonder whether the story had actually happened at all. My intention is to use this simple fait divers to build a subjective universe containing these elements; girls’ obsessions, family webs, fear of death, intrigues, secrets, as well as subtle variations on cruelty and violence – set where the Balkans meet the Mediterranean sea.
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