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- Digital Guide: Velibor Božović: Elsewhere, on Record
Digital Guide: Velibor Božović: Elsewhere, on Record
Curated by Emily McKibbon
October 16, 2025 – February 15, 2026
Download the Large Font PDF Guide
“When you eliminate the narrative and syntax, every life is relatable.”
— Velibor Božović, 2025
Installation Images
Elsewhere, on Record looks at the ways in which life stories are told and retold, remembered and distorted, or pieced together from available fragments. Reflecting the artist’s experience of conflict and migration—Božović grew up in Sarajevo, Bosnia-Herzegovina, where he remained throughout the Siege of Sarajevo—the show considers the narratives that build and shape our experiences of dislocation and loss.
This survey exhibition brings together several bodies of work from throughout Božović’s career, all taking memory or storytelling as their subject. Encore, Odyssey, features 97 books, all dedicated to an unknown reader in a different year of the 20th century. In Seeing, There is No Right or Wrong finds Božović returning to his contact sheets made between 1999 and 2013, printing the dark, overexposed frames that appeared there. These failed photographs come to define the work, shifting our attention to what remains unseen. Omissions also define the narratives in Unfolding Elsewheres, transcriptions of Bosnian migration stories gathered by Božović and his childhood friend, novelist Aleksandar Hemon. A cluster of works—My Prisoner, On Record—are more personal, capturing the experiences of Božović and his family during, before and after the Bosnian War.
This exhibition also includes the third edition of Radio Elsewheres, an art and community radio project organized by Božović, Steve Bates, and Claudia Zini. Radio Elsewheres will be live from the gallery between October 16 and November 5, 2025.
Velibor Božović, Encore, Odyssey, 2014 – 2017. Books, sound installation. Courtesy of the artist.
Encore, Odyssey comprises inscribed books from nearly every year of the 20th century. Purchased at two used bookstores in Montreal — Encore and Odyssey — each book has been inscribed by a reader in a different year of the 20th century and hints at the lives their previous owners have lived. Once private, these inscriptions become public in the space of the gallery. The work is an homage to books and the culture of reading and reflects how the expansion of literacy and the growth of the popular press shaped 20th century life. Described by some as the century of the book, the 20th century was also the most violent one in human history.
A voiceover, punctuated by silence, provides paragraphs of different books, never giving a title or author. Like much of Božović’s work, the work hints at a narrative that never resolves in a full revelation.
Velibor Božović, My Prisoner, 1994/2014. HD video, 26 minutes 36 seconds. Courtesy of the artist.
During his MFA studies at Concordia University, the artis became interested in the work of memory, and particularly his memories of an event that occurred on April 3, 1994, in the midst of the Bosnian War. My Prisoner blends re-enactments and archival footage to reconstruct a filmed meeting between Božović and his father, who was then a prisoner of war for the Bosnian Army, which the artist served during the defense of Sarajevo.
Eighteen years later, the artist found a copy of the footage, and upon reviewing it realized the extent to which his memory of the event was compromised. From this, he decided to recreate what was not filmed, but what he remembered vividly. A re-enactment of a car ride through beautiful scenery is interspersed with archival footage of the meeting. A conversation between a military intelligence officer and an actor portraying the artist centres on a seemingly minor issue: Shine on You Crazy Diamond by Pink Floyd on the radio, which the intelligence officer misidentifies. The film is silent but for the conversation between the actors, and the sound of the car shifting gears through the mountainous landscape. The actor portraying Božović does not correct the officer’s mistake, and the car ride continues.
The artist writes: “I often recall my own past with disbelief. My memory may have distorted some of my experiences (perhaps all of them), but to what extent? If an audio/visual document of what truly happened existed, how much of what I remember would change after hearing/seeing such a document?”
Velibor Božović, From the series: In Seeing, There is No Right No Wrong, 2008-2018. Gelatin silver prints on fiber-based paper
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While preparing for a solo exhibition in Montreal, Velibor Božović returned to his negatives made between 1999-2013. While looking at contact sheets, the dark rectangles showing missed exposures caught his attention. These photographs were taken between Montreal and Sarajevo, the artist’s hometown, and interrupted the linear narrative of his travels.
Sometimes it was clear what the photographs were intended to show or where they were taken, but other times it was not. The artist found these omissions more interesting than the photographs around them, stating: “I decided to treat these as if they are the most precious photographs that I ever took. I printed them larger than I have ever printed. They are gelatin silver prints on a fibre-based paper. Really beautiful. There is no visual information on it. But when you stand in front of them—they’re all supposed to be the same, but they are not.”
Velibor Božović, On Record, 2025, Record player, sound, photograph, installation. Courtesy of the artist.
On Record is an album stitched together from two conversations between the artist and his mother, over two meals they shared during his last visit with her in December of 2024. His mother — who the artist describes as “a force of nature, but very vulnerable”— passed away shortly afterwards.
The conversation is in the Bosnian language and will not be understood by most visitors. Even those who speak the language might struggle to find the narrative in the story. In the background, more universally legible noises are heard — cats fighting, cutlery scraping across dinner plates, a tap running. The work is pressed onto a single record — the one in the gallery — which can be played by visitors. At the end of the recording, the stylus reverts to a locked groove, spinning endlessly without producing sound.
Velibor Božović, From the series: Unfolding Elsewheres. Inkjet prints on paper. 2016/2017. Courtesy of the artist.
- Untitled, from Unfolding Elsewheres, 2017
- Listening, Zlatko, 03 Dec 2016, St. Louis
- Listening, Senada, 20 Nov 2016, Miami Beach
- Listening, Dženana, 09 Dec 2016, St. Louis
- Listening, Amir, 08 Oct 2016, Iowa City
- Listening, Azra, 10 Dec 2016, St. Louis
- Listening, Amila, 22 Aug 2016, Toronto
- Listening, Milomir, 10 Jan 2017, Paris
- Listening, Adi, 21 Oct 2017, Toronto
- Listening, Aida, 11 Dec 2016, St. Louis
- Listening, Eva, 23 Oct 2017, Montreal
- Listening, Džemal, 09 Dec 2016, St. Louis
- Listening, Emir K., 09 Oct 2016, Chicago
- Listening, Emir Č., 22 Apr 2017, Des Moins
Unfolding Elsewheres is a series of oral histories gathered by the artist and his friend, the novelist Aleksandar Hemon. They capture the experiences of Bosnians in diaspora, and their relationship to the war decades after they have settled elsewhere. Created in response to the dehumanizing media portrayal of asylum seekers, the work points to the stories of individuals whose lives were altered by events beyond their control.
As Božović transcribed these narratives, certain keywords stood out. At first, he presented them on white paper, and soon images were added to complement the narratives.
The artist reflects: “So often I am asked where I am from, and when I say Bosnia, I’m already seen in a certain way. So many things are already assigned to you, just by the fact that there was a war there. 95% of life is life, but there was this war in Bosnia — it was four years of war that changed everything for everybody. But even in this significant conflict — it’s just a part of our lives, it is not everything that we Bosnians are. In this work I eliminate the syntax, so that every life becomes more relatable — almost everyone everywhere went to school, fell in love, watched cartoons, played video games… Anybody in the world can relate to all of that.”
Velibor Božović, Steve Bates, and Claudia Zini, Radio Elsewheres. 2025. Radio broadcast
Radio Elsewheres (RE) is an online and terrestrial low-power digital radio art project conceptualized, produced, and curated by artists Velibor Božović and Steve Bates, along with art historian and curator Claudia Zini.
Radio Elsewheres’ focus is on movement and displacement — whether voluntary or forced — of human and non-human bodies, languages, ideas, recipes, botany, musical tuning systems, and stories. They are also interested in cycles of extinction, birth, decay, and re-emergence. Radio Elsewheres operates as an event-based platform, coming together for intense periods of transmissions of art, ideas, and research, broadcasting 24/7 before pausing to develop its online archive and network for future actions.
As a fluid assembly of human and non-human voices across languages, RE explores and expands the meaning of listening — to and from ‘elsewheres.’ The deliberate misuse of the word acknowledges both the possibilities and challenges of acquiring new languages and identities.
Radio Elsewheres investigates borders and their transgressions. Who moves? Who has moved? Who decides who moves? And what does it mean to come to rest, whether temporarily or permanently? RE is a sound space where radio and sound art intersect with social engagement, creating a dynamic platform for artists, storytellers, and listeners to explore these questions through conversation and various aural interventions.
About the Artist: Velibor Božović
We would like to acknowledge funding support from the Ontario Arts Council and the Government of Ontario.
