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LONJSKO POLJE - WATER IN THE CLOUDS

The story of Lonjsko Polje is a story of life by the river. Although it owes its name to the river Lonja, the destiny of this valley is linked with the river Sava. Its geographical position would suggest a region which plays a significant role in modern life thanks to the important waterway which crosses it.

Delimited by Sisak, Kutina, Petrinja and Nova Gradiška, this area could evoke in a casual observer the impression that this is a fluvial belt offering exceptional possibilities of regional development to its inhabitants.

The reverse is the case: for more than a hundred years Lonjsko Polje and its inhabitants have imperceptibly shared the destiny of the Sava backwaters, meanders with no source or mouth which just quietly wind their way through wasteland inhabited by birds or game, and visited occasionally by an angler or hunter.

One of the rare integrally preserved regions with an impressive, original heritage of wooden architecture, a region for centuries at the crossroads of different and often conflicting cultures, Lonjsko Polje has sunk today into slumber from which, fortunately enough, it is slowly awakening. The history of the Military Frontier, repeated so tragically and forcefully in the recent past, is receding to the favour of inquisitive visitors in love with virgin nature. Hopefully, the future will provide reasons which will keep people here, and even more promote their return, so that villages like Čigoč or Krapje will not be remembered merely by the fascinating flights of storks reviving them every year, but also recognized as sites of a continuous traditional culture, equally important to the local population and to visitors who find in the Lonjsko Polje Nature Park a rare oasis of peace, a virgin environment and a range of views unique throughout the Posavina region.

The natural attractions and the current moment in the life of Lonjsko Polje are the salient features of the photographic mosaic set up by Dražen Lapić, Željko Jelenski, and Walter and Tomislav Rastić, a mosaic which transcends by far and large the scope of just another photomonograph. Instead of a visual nomenclature, of an educational listing of the building blocks which shape the destiny of specific places or human lives, they offer us a way to read the landscape, the "wild" and the humanly cultivated one alike. If one were to seek a common denominator for this project, the key notion might be "stillness". The stillness captured in the work of these four artists is not affected by the rising of a flight of birds - it is invaluable stillness to the contemporary observer.

The absence of trivial interest focused on exploitation, and the peace which derives from it, is the greatest treasure of Lonjsko Polje. This photographic initiative is also an "instruction for use" of sorts. The virgin segment of nature must be known, we must learn to love/watch it and, accordingly, determine for it a future which will leave it intact, recognizable and above all protected.

The slumbering landscape from the beginning of this story must be awakened gently and with all due respect so that tomorrow we can take pride in yet another impressive contribution to the overall culture of living in Croatia.

Krešimir Oremović