Semâ Bekirović

ROZENSTRAAT — a rose is a rose is a rose is very proud to present Semâ Bekirović’s film installation Once an Alien!

In her first feature film, the science-fiction documentary Once an Alien (2023), Semâ Bekirović follows her father Mirza Bekirović through Bosnia and Herzegovina. Together they embark on a search for their roots. But as much as Mirza would like to return, the country that he fled during the Second World War no longer exists. Traveling in a camper van through awe-inspiring landscapes, a picture unfolds of a man with a shattered past marked by migration and trauma. Above all, however, the film delineates the bond between father and daughter, and the importance of imagination and ingenuity to them both. Mirza became an inventor; his creativity functioned as a survival mechanism. The sense of resilience he drew from this he always actively transmitted to Semâ.

Gradually the film blurs the line between fantasy and reality. Personal memories are interspersed with surreal scenes of Mirza in a time travel suit, powerful atmospheric images and semi-documentary scenes in which various locals are interviewed. Each of them addresses a different facet of the concept of time, in both scientific and more magical-realist ways. In these encounters, it becomes clear that Mirza connects with them not because of sharing the same ‘blood’, but through a mutual sense of displacement, a nostalgic longing, and a desire to return to another time. Ultimately, he argues, we are all time travellers.

At the request of ROZENSTRAAT, Arthur Jules (France, 1990) designed a sitting and reading area near the film installation. During the exhibition, meetings of a reading group on the theme ‘the relationship between science and storytelling’ will take place there, led by Semâ, composer Marcus Bruystens and visual artist Ruth Legg. Please email info@rozenstraat.com for more information about the reading group and registration!

Please note that Once an Alien starts at three set times; at 13.30, 15.00 and 16.30.

In the press:

A review by Anna van Leeuwen in De Volkskrant on May 25 2023.

‘Semâ Bekirović @ ROZENSTRAAT’ by Saskia Monshouwer on the website Jegens&Tevens on May 31 2023.

‘Sterren en gaten’ by Joke de Wolf in De Groene Amsterdammer on June 21 2023.

An open letter to Semâ by Lena van Tijen on the website of MetropolisM on July 10 2023.

An open letter to Lena van Tijen by Semâ on the website of MetropolisM on July 25 2023.