Schöne Bilder meiner Mutter

Nurture, intimacy, softness. What others associate with the term „mother" was never the first thing I thought of, when I thought of my mother. Having fled the war in Sarajevo for an uncertain future in Germany, Sabina built a few years later, a new, old home for herself and me, her five-year-old son, from nothing in a destroyed city. Sabina's life is and was marked by insecurities and existential fears, but she knows how to hide them very skilfully that even I, as her son, occasionally have difficulties looking behind the facade of this strong, independent woman. With my long-term project Schöne Bilder meiner Mutter, I am trying to approach Sabina Željo, this woman who is my mother, but still sometimes alien to me. On the one hand, I am showing Sabina how she likes to present herself in public. At the same time I am trying to capture the quiet, mostly undiscovered moments with and of her, like discovering the true nature of my mother. What gives us more insights into how we deal with our own fears, worries and inadequacies than a look at our own family.