Trafika Europe 5 - Slovenian Interlude

A note about the artwork

Samira Kentrić

All artwork in this issue is taken from the new graphic novel Balkanalia , by Samira Kentrić, published in Slovenian this year by Beletrina Academic Press.

A self-styled “opinion illustrator”, Samira has illustrated many books of humanist thinkers, and visualized international news, including on themes of EU integration, religious disputes and social struggles. She is also an international performer and intellectually provocative visual artist. Balkanalia is her first book – not yet available in English – an autobiographical coming-of-age graphic novel told in pictures and words, tracing family and childhood, from Soviet Socialism up through the break-up of Yugoslavia, the rise of nationalisms and beyond. As she says: “The words of a migrant child make it obvious that she always knew that she belonged nowhere. But she did belong to people, ideas and ideals. So home could be

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