Dragonja FootNotes (2023) (21 min)
Authors: Dragonja FootNotes Collective
Dragonja Footnotes Collective Martina Bofulin, Nataša Gregorič Bon, Ana Jelnikar, Urša Kanjir, Lucija Klun, Špela Ledinek Lozej, Jernej Mlekuž, Primož Pipan, Ana Reberc, Igor Rogelja, Nataša Rogelja Caf, and Nick Shepherd
Camera Špela Ledinek Lozej and Živa Caf
Script Špela Ledinek Lozej and Nataša Rogelja Caf
Editing Živa Caf
The video essay is a multifaceted work that reflects (on) the possibilities of the walking seminar, a research event that intertwines walking with writing, the sensorial with the discursive, the haptic with the reflective, video documenting with creative editing. Created as part of the Routes Biographies project it documents the walk of twelve researchers along the course of the Istrian river Dragonja, revealing their steps and words, their thinking-through-writing. While walking, they encounter various lives along – and with – the river. The traces left by migrants, the remains of former settlers, farmers, their imprints on the landscape, the stories of artists and new urban settlers, as well as animal remains. The Dragonja route is in constant dialogue with borders, and their green or barbed wire materialities. Through these encounters, a complex and changing Dragonja-ness unfolds as a productive force: a muse, a border, a route, or a pernicious dragon that nurtures but also takes away human lives.
