Excerpt from Safe Area Goražde by Joe Sacco (2000)

During the Bosnian war (1992-1995), the small city of Goražde was surrounded by territories under the Serbian army’s control and had to organize its daily life in a self-sufficiency that was supplemented by a UN enforced humanitarian corridor.  This self-sufficiency includes the power supply that was lacking at a systematic level.  Goražde inhabitants had therefore to cope with this status off the grid and individuals and neighbor groups undertook to tinker various machines amongst which those micro hydro power plants strike us for their ingenuity.  Both the drawings of Joe Sacco in his documentary graphic novel Safe Area Goražde (see also The Fixer in a previous article), and the photographs taken by Zobrazit during the war constitute rare witnesses of their historical presence on the Drina River. 

Goražde’s Mini Centrales / Photograph by Zobrazit via profimedia

Goražde’s Mini Centrales / Photograph by zobrazit via profimedia

Goražde’s Mini Centrales / Photograph by zobrazit via profimedia

Goražde’s Mini Centrales / Photograph by zobrazit via profimedia