How Did We Get Here?

“How many deaths are needed to be able to live?”

Gregor Zorc and Matej Recer – two exceptional storytellers, playfully push us into a whirl of different time periods, personal histories, stories of their parents, acquaintances and strangers. The intimate narrative is based on the horrors of the Second World War, which wrestle with the peaceful homeliness of Podgorje, survival strategies in Yugoslavia with the cosmopolitanism of global capitalism, village solidarity with urban mistrust, life with death. How many disappointments do we need for true love; how much fear to muster the courage to face the unknown; how much hatred must we overcome to begin reconciliation; how many times we have to fail to find our potential; how much loss we have to endure to be happy; how many times do we have to leave to arrive; and how many deaths are needed to be able to live?

The modern bards uncompromisingly confront us with cultural differences, different times, but the same spaces. By overturning social contexts through individual stories, they build insight into the essence of humanity. The authors talk more about us than about themselves. At the same time, their question “How did we get here?” already offers the answer: “We can only move forward together!”