This year our Festival lost one of its most important contributors and founders – Ljubomir-Ljuba Reljić.

Ljubomir Reljić began working at the Ethnographic Museum in Belgrade in 1959, after earning his graduate degree in Ethnology. At the beginning of his curator career he worked in the Illustrative Department of the Museum, organizing photo-documentation. There he had an opportunity to study several rolls of film material that were prepared by Petar Ž. Petrović, former fellow curator and one the pioneers of ethnographic film in Serbia. It inspired Ljuba Reljić to choose ethnographic film as one of his scientific and research priorities. He gradually enriched his field and professional experience and realized that there was very little time left to record on film the authentic traditional culture of Serbia, primarily rural, as the intrusion of modern urban and industrial culture started to slowly push it out of the everyday life. His approach to film was expressed in two ways: one was to record on film exactly what was happening at a given moment, in its full meaning for the community, but also in interaction with the existing documents and scientific viewpoints; the other way was to use an existing ethnographic record to reconstruct the probable content of certain tradition.

He researched a wide range of topics, mostly in the field of spiritual culture, such as: the customs of the life cycle, slava, the cult of the dead; and also the customs of the annual cycle such as Christmas, Easter, St. George’s Day, St. John’s Day, as well as ceremonial processions. His work also included contributions to ethnographic and documentary films on rural communal labor, material culture (for example crafts) etc.

As a cinematography aficionado, he not only explored the aforementioned ethnographic topics but also was an initiator and founder of the Festival of Ethnological Film, which has been organized at the Ethnographic Museum in Belgrade every year since 1992. In line with his original idea and ambition, the Festival started mostly with works from the national television production, presenting the folklore and customs of Balkan and Slavic people, while in time it gradually started to include an enviable scope of topics in cultural and social anthropology from all continents. Ljubomir Reljić made numerous films, some produced by the Ethnographic Museum in Belgrade and some in cooperation with TV Belgrade. Films produced by the Ethnographic Museum include Farmer Candles, Easter at Sefkerin and Mandaline of Sefkerin. He wrote scripts and was expert consultant for over 80 episodes of the documentary series “Serbian Heritage” for TV Belgrade. Films Thirst of the Dead and Christmas at Polimlje, for which he was expert consultant, received Grand Prix at Dublin (Ireland) and Grand Prix of the International Festival of Ethnological Film in Belgrade.

The following films in the making of which he participated will be screened at the Festival:

Farmer Candles, dir. Siniša Dimitrijević, 1995, 29’

Christmas at Polimlje, dir. Milan Knežević, 1997, 35’

The Magical Circle of Flowers, dir. Slobodan Simojlović, 2003, 21’

Petrovdan in Semberija, dir. Slobodan Simojlović, 2005, 28’