From time to time I work for a daily tabloid newspaper due to certain circumstances. As in all other newspapers, the newspaper I work for has also the department for information, sports, photojournalism, politics, as well as the so called V.I.P. and crime scene reporting departments. Departments for information and politics mostly ″copy″ their photographs from agency sites such as Beta, Tanjug, A.P. and others, so that photographers do not have to do any field work, to use the newspaper jargon. Photojournalism is rare. Only a few privileged photographers can cover sports events, because they have powerful photographic lenses. What all of us others ″wind up with″ are show biz and crime scene reports. Since I am not a big fan of the local V.I.P. scene, that is I am not following what is going on in the world of folk music and similar topics, I am working in the only field that is left, namely the crime scene reporting. These photographs have proven to be more close to life, and in my case much more complex than paparazzo and show biz photographs.
The situations happening around crime scenes are situations like for example the case on ″Branko’s bridge″ one year ago during a suicide attempt of one young man, when one passer by photographed her children with all the commotion in the background. The case of a renowned photographer who could not resist publishing the photographs of her late lover Susan Sontag lying on her hospital bed, which brought her a law suit by the deceased’s son, is very famous.
All these circumstances are very inspirational for experimental photography which I am doing in the field, following the crime scene news, but also photographing the situations from a different, wider perspective, so that besides the actual situation the frame contains my self-portrait or some of my accessories, e.g. shoes or similar. I even sometimes ask my colleagues to photograph me while I’m photographing a certain situation. The project is realized through cooperation with the local newspaper. This project reflects my radical attitude about reality.
