On 24 November 2010, NGO Slavika’s Youth Embassy of Culture promoted a short documentary film on their project “Monument to the last Bosnian bogumil”, designed as a cornerstone of their activities. It involved symbolic raising of the “stećak”, a monumental medieval tombstones found scattered across Bosnia and Herzegovina and unique in Europe.

Great painter Lazar Drljača’s last wish was to be buried as a “Bogumil” with “stećak” as his gravestone. The significance of Lazar Drljača is that he wasn’t aligned to any religious group and he was continentally famous with exhibitions in London, Paris and elsewhere. Because of this, Slavika’s “Monument to last Bosnian Bogumil” served as a perfect initiation project for the Embassy.  

“The aim is to promote the culture through general public and especially youth.  This project is not for promotion purpose, but it acts as a first step in cultural renewal of greatest European cultural treasures.  We built a monument to the “Last Bosnian Bogumil” Lazar Drljača not because he is “nobody’s” in terms of nationality, but because he is everybody’s. This great project gives new perspective to all young generations who work on it and to those who will see it finished. Our first and foremost message is: Together!” – stated proud founder of Slavika and BiH Intercultural Navigator, Samir Arnautović.

^{Members of Slavika at the film promotion}

British Council BiH supported the project with seed funds and Slavika raised significant contributions from other partners. Slavika will now shift its focus on the next project, producing a Slavika Cultural Calendar of significant dates from the BiH history which will be made available to schools and meant to be displayed as permanent exhibits in classrooms.

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