ASSITEJ Magazine 2019

SONJA PETROVIĆ COMPLETED HER GRADUATE AND
POSTGRADUATE STUDIES IN THEATRE DIRECTING.
SINCE 2009 SHE IS THE HEAD OF FESTIVAL OF
ECOLOGICAL THEATRE FOR CHILDREN AND YOUTH,
WHICH IS CELEBRATING ITS 25TH ANNIVERSARY IN 2019.
LOCAL AND INTERNATIONAL PROFESSIONAL THEATRE
COMPANIES PERFORM AT THE FESTIVAL, AND IT IS
MANAGED BY PROFESSIONALS WHO, LIKE SONJA, HAVE
GROWN TOGETHER WITH IT. (WWW.FEP.ORG.RS)
I am a child who was born
one day for a reason probably
different from other children’s
reasons, or perhaps the very
same one.
I am just a child who’s been growing up in Serbia,
a country that’s changed names six times and
with changing borderlines. In those times surviving
meant having one’s stomach full, and one’s head
empty. Because who’s going to think of heads
when our lives are at stake. It took place in Bačka
Palanka. A small town in the flatlands of Vojvodina,
in the north of what is now Serbia, in a country
called Yugoslavia at the time.
I am just a child who grew up in this small town
– a town with no museums, cinemas, art galleries,
theatres… A city with no notion of culture or
spiritual welfare.
However, I am that same child who grew up in a
town in which the Festival of Ecological Theatre for
Children and Youth took place, quite by accident,
as it seemed to me at the time.
Just like that… with no stage, no stage lights, no
expectations, no plan, no money…
Against the empty headedness, against the
absence of delight, against not having an opinion,
against the lull, against the senselessness, and
in favor of, I guess, the very essence, the first
Festival of Ecological Theatre for Children took
place.
Because of the great desire, because of individuals’
needs, because of those who missed the long
forgotten food for thought. Because of the
children, because of the grown-ups. Because of
all of them together, and maybe, even slightly,
because of me.
The actors were flabbergasted by children climbing
up on stage to remove the villains, the viewers in
complete and utter shock, everyone yelling, trying
to speak over each other for reasons only known
to themselves, and I am three years old, sitting in
the front row, at the edge of my seat, watching my
very first theatre play. Next to my heart, I have a
tag saying MEMBER OF CHILDREN’S JURY. And I’m
watching peacefully. Quite calmly, as everything
seems to be moving inside a bubble, and if I
were to but sneeze, everything would burst and
disappear. And I don’t know anything, of anything,
of anyone, or what on earth is happening right
there, but I’m enjoying myself and am really careful
to preserve this moment inside a bubble. I don’t
even know how this importance is manifested, but
I do know that the tag next to my heart is very
important and essential, and what I feel even more
acutely, but am still not able to tell, is that I’m
enjoying myself. And I’m laughing.... Later I would
learn it’s called love.
To this very day I laugh just like that. As if I were
enjoying myself, delighted, and as if I knew I
mattered.
It’s been exactly 25 years since that moment.
Everything else is more or less the same.
36 Towards the Unknown – Confronting the Present