Heartefact
history
2025
In 2025, Heartefact’s work was defined by continuity, expansion, and a deepened regional presence in a context marked by political uncertainty and increasing pressure on independent cultural and civic actors. Across its three pillars, the organization continued to combine artistic production, public engagement, and human rights advocacy.
Through the Heartefact Foundation, 2025 marked a significant programmatic expansion. The Culture for Democracy (CfD) project in Serbia entered its second phase, supporting 22 artistic projects and 4 organizations through Boost Grants, alongside 10 additional grants within the Human Rights Leadership Program. In parallel, Heartefact launched the Culture for Development project in North Macedonia, supported by the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC), introducing a comprehensive support framework that, in its first year, funded 19 artistic projects, 5 institutional grants, and 2 job shadowing initiatives, alongside public events and capacity-building programs across 8 cities.
Heartefact House reaffirmed its position as a vital space for socially engaged theatre with productions traveling from Belgrade to Sarajevo, Prishtina, Tirana, Milan, Leipzig, Groningen, and New York. The premiere of They Are All Gone (directed by Andrej Nosov, written by Doruntina Basha), created in co-production with SARTR (BiH) and My Balkans (USA, Serbia), in cooperation with La MaMa Experimental Theatre Club (USA), Ibsen Scope (Norway) and Allianz Foundation (Germany), marked one of the central artistic moments of the year, engaging with memory and the legacy of the Srebrenica genocide. The new co-production Art&Money with SWEETS/PotatoPotato (by Swedish artist Freja Hallberg) explored the tension between artistic creation and economic structures. The repertoire remained highly active with over 80 performances for 7000 audience members. Through the Theatre Caravan, performances reached smaller towns in Serbia opening space for dialogue on gender, trauma, and social norms beyond major cultural centers.
The 14th Competition for the Best Contemporary Engaged Drama received record 170 submissions. The award was given to Aleksandra Urošević for her play Female Child, which thoughtfully and subtly explores existential questions of the female experience. Through European platforms such as Fabulamundi and Playground, Heartefact supported emerging playwrights through workshops, residencies, and international exchanges, while the newly established Sarajevo Theatre Showcase gathered over 200 professionals and marked itself as a key regional platform for collaboration, industry peaches and networking opportunities.
HF Institute further strengthened its role as a space for knowledge production and advocacy. Through the Human Rights Leadership Program, Heartefact worked with 40 fellows from 15 cities across Serbia, supporting campaigns addressing gender-based violence, minority rights, social justice… Advocacy initiatives such as Ćutanje nije zlato (Silence is not Golden) addressing gender-based violence and Ima mesta za sve(There is a place for everybody) addressing questions of tolerance, translated programmatic work into public interventions, while the regional Yes Means Yes initiative focused on redefining legal and social understandings of sexual violence and consent-based legal frameworks. The Serbia-Kosovo Reconnection Program continued through a series of visiting programs and exchanges, engaging more than 30 artists, activists, and professionals in sustained dialogue on gender equality, memory, and post-conflict cooperation.
With active programs in Serbia, Kosovo, and North Macedonia, and sustained partnerships across the Western Balkans and Europe, Heartefact continued to act as a connector between disciplines, communities, and social realities.
2024
In 2024, Heartefact was marked by both continuity and transformation: not only in our programming, but also in how we position ourselves in the region. We continued to strengthen our role through HF Fondation and HF House, while also taking a major step forward by formally establishing a third programmatic pillar: HF Institute, dedicated to research and the development of new narratives around key social issues. Finally, the end of the year was marked by a crucial regional shift: we formally established offices in Prishtina and Skopje, while further strengthening strategic collaboration in Bosnia and Herzegovina, primarily with SARTR (Sarajevo War Theatre).
In the final year of implementation of Phase I of Culture for Democracy (CfD), the first comprehensive, long-term intervention in the field of culture and art in Serbia supported by the Swiss Government, we supported an additional 19 projects through the Grants for Artistic Expressions scheme, 9 projects through the Art Boost line, and awarded 5 new Job Shadowing supports. The project’s final conference, Cultural Nexus, was held in Niš, bringing together organizations and individuals from Serbia’s independent cultural scene. Through discussions, panels, and group work, we mapped the key outcomes of four years of support as well as strategic directions for the project’s next phase. Over the four years of implementation, we supported a total of 89 projects, positioning Culture for Democracy as a cornerstone for the survival of independent culture and art in Serbia over the past period.
HF HOUSE produced two new performances while also delivering more than 80 performances across Serbia, the region, and Europe. We premiered How I Learned to Drive (directed by Tara Manić, written by Paula Vogel) and All the Good Barbies (directed by Đorđe Nešović, based on the novel by Katarina Mitrović). We continued staging Our Son, which also toured to Sarajevo and Düsseldorf, as well as The Finger and A Short History of Burgers and Other Stories, performed at the Noorderzon Festival in Groningen. One of the most important ways we expanded audiences and opened conversations on sensitive topics outside major centers in 2024 was through the HF Theatre Caravan, reaching cities such as Pirot, Niš, Ruma, Arilje, Užice, Lazarevac, Aleksandrovac, Požarevac, Bečej, and others. For the sixth year in a row, we contributed to the theatre segment of Belgrade Pride Week by producing the performance Boys Just Want To Have Fun with the Swedish company Il Dance. In the field of contemporary drama, the 13th Contest for the Best Contemporary Engaged Dramatic Text received 117 submissions, and the jury (Ozren Grabarić, Božo Koprivica, Biljana Srbljanović) awarded first prize to Mirza Skenderagić for the play Baci je Putine i budi precizan. As part of the European playwright network Fabulamundi, we hosted a major three-day network conference at HF HOUSE, welcoming more than 50 international guests and enabling intensive exchange with the local theatre scene. Together with partners from Italy, France, and Romania, we also launched a new European project supporting emerging playwrights: Playground (2024–2026). We continued activities within several other European projects as well: within Poets of Today – Voices of Tomorrow, the ToolBook was published in five languages; through Slavic Soundwalking, we launched an interactive mobile application; while Eclectic of Otherness entered its final phase with premieres of three new productions and the realization of Festivities of Otherness in Zagreb, Belgrade, and Paris. As executive producers and co-organizers, we co-organized the exhibition UKRAINE: LOVE + WAR (2014–2024), and our podcast Pleasure in Text, hosted by Biljana Srbljanović and Vladimir Cerić, continued its steady monthly publishing, with a total of 16 episodes released.
With the establishment of HF INSTITUTE, we made a strategic leap forward: through the Human Rights Leadership Program, we worked with 23 activists from 14 cities across Serbia, focusing on campaigns capable of generating concrete local change. Through the Reconnection program, we continued creating space for new perspectives and stronger links between Kosovo and Serbian society through two main formats: the Fellowship Program (with 13 published research papers on cooperation and relations) and the Kosovo–Serbia Visiting Program, which included 38 participants.
2023
In 2023, we celebrated one year of the existence of the Heartefact theater space in the center of Belgrade with over 80 performances of our own, guest, and student plays, with more than 5000 visitors who passed through the Heartefact House. We enriched the repertoire with two new premieres: the author project Before We Begin by Jug Đorđević and Tijana Grumić, as well as the author project Climax by Patrick Lazić and Dunja Matić.
With special pride, we included our longest-running play, Finger, which premiered in 2012 based on the winning text by Doruntina Bashe in the Heartefact drama competition. Last year’s premiere Our Son continued its successful European theater tour, with eight performances at the Dublin festival, guest appearances in Timisoara, Zagreb, Bratislava, and ending the year with an award for best play according to the choice of a young jury at the Fast Forward festival in Dresden.
With several humanitarian performances of the play Before We Begin, we supported Novi Sad Pride Week and the free psychological assistance provided by the “Da se zna!” association to the LGBTI+ community. We also launched a queer caravan where we perform our plays with minority perspectives in smaller towns in Serbia, followed by discussions with the local audience on these sensitive topics.
Traditionally, we participated in organizing this year’s largest and most inclusive Belgrade Pride, where solidarity was shown by many citizens residing in Serbia due to wars in their countries. The theater program during Pride Week was accompanied by guest performances from Pula, Prishtina, domestic plays, and exhibitions, including an emotional presentation of the poetry collection by long-time human rights activist Boban Stojanović and the first meeting of the new European theater network of theaters and organizations dealing with queer and minority perspectives, which we initiated.
A record-breaking 163 entries were received for the 12th Contest for the Best Contemporary Engaged Dramatic Text, and the jury composed of Dubravka Vrgoč, Molina Udovički Fotez, and Biljana Srbljanović selected Marija Rakočević’s text “The Woman Ties a Ponytail” as the winner. The jury also singled out texts by Aleksandra Glovacki, Sara Radojković, Hana Konse, and Anita Čeko. As a continuation of nurturing contemporary dramatic writing, we joined the European network of playwrights Fabulamundi, consisting of 19 playwrights from across Europe, represented by Biljana Srbljanović and Patrick Lazić for Serbia and Heartefact.
We also continued activities on the Creative Europe project Poets of Today, Voices of Tomorrow, where we presented 10 of our young poets to the audience through several public events and concluded the year with visits to 16 primary and secondary schools in Serbia by our poetry caravan, introducing contemporary poetry to young people.
We involved twenty-five contemporary Serbian writers in the Slavic Soundwalking project, where we developed a mobile application for an interactive tour of Belgrade, Zagreb, and Ljubljana listening to short urban stories, which will be launched in 2024. At the end of next year, three European co-productions developed throughout this year with organizations from Croatia and France as part of the Eclectic of Otherness project will be performed in Belgrade, addressing the question of what it means to be different in the context of today’s Europe.
Heartafact’s podcast “Pleasure in Text” (srb. Zadovoljstvo u tekstu) by Biljana Srbljanović and Vladimir Cerić, which has been broadcast in over 220 episodes.
We continued to tell new stories about the relationship between Kosovar and Serbian society. We continued to work on building good neighborly relations between Serbs and Albanians, believing in the historical opportunity for authorities and both societies to accept reality.
Through two cycles of calls for visiting programs, we enabled 22 people from Serbia and Kosovo to connect and develop (future) cooperation. The selection of the first 7 researchers within the fellowship program, exploring new and constructive narratives on various social, political, and economic topics, was particularly significant. Two online conferences were held to discuss the relationship between Kosovo and Serbia, and we organized 11 educational labs for young people called At Second Glance.
We took the audience of Heartefact House to Prishtina to visit the Kosovo Theatre Showcase, where our play A Short History of Burgers and Other Stories was performed, and three Kosovar artists presented their work in Belgrade: Fidan Bejtullahu with the exhibition Embrace, and Yllka Brada and Tadi collaborated on the costumes and music design for the play Climax as part of the Reconnection 2.0 project.
2022
This year was marked by the processes of transformation, on an organizational but also on a programmatic level. Two years ago, we became partners with the PeaceNexus foundation which resulted in new strategic documents and a new systematization. In order to achieve our vision more effectively, we divided our programmatic lines into two parts: HF House and HF Foundation. We opened our new space, Heartefact House in the center of Belgrade where we had three premieres of new productions: Our Son (author and director: Patrik Lazic), A Short History of Burgers and other stories (project by author: Andrej Nosov) and Would be a Shame If the Plants Died (author and director: Ivor Martinic). During Pride Week, we organized the Fourth Pride Theater Festival held during EuroPride 2022, the biggest European LGBTQ+ event. We opened the House doors for regional guests that can (often) be watched on other Belgrade scenes. Our first guest was from the Sarajevo War Theater and their play Visiting Mr Green, a project by Alban Ukaj, Miki Trifunov and Nejra Babic. As part of the Reconnection 2.0 project, we also organized the performance of the Kosovar play Handke Project at the Biter Theater, and we also performed our play Our Son in Prishtina and Gjilan (where we were the first Serbian play to perform in over 23 years) and we held four artistic residencies of Serbian artists in Prishtina and Kosovar artists in Belgrade. We published the Serbian translation of two new plays of known Kosovar author Doruntina Basha. On Heartefact’s 11th competition for the best contemporary socially engaged play script, the winning text was the Milk Purchase by an author from Osijek, Davor Spisic. We got the support of the Creative Europe program funded by the European Union for four projects, and in 2022, we started our first activities within the Poets of Today – Voices of Tomorrow project that aims for poetry to be regularly implemented within school classrooms in a new and innovative way. During EuroPride 2022, we organized and/or co-produced around 10 exhibitions of queer artists, and near the end of the year we took part in the production of a big exhibition by Mrdjan Bajic – The Unreliable Narrator at the Museum of Contemporary Art. We celebrated the 200th episode of the podcast Pleasure in the Text by Biljana Srbljanovic and Vladimir Ceric. We were awarded the Ibsen Scope Grant for our project They Have Already Gone, a play in the making dealing with the Srebrenica genocide. As implementers of the Culture for Democracy (CfD) project, we supported 21 projects from the field of contemporary art and culture: 13 grants for artistic and cultural projects, 6 partner grants and 2 job shadowing grants. We implemented 3 more Kosovo School cycles for 30 young people from Serbia and Kosovo.
2021
As a special program within the Heartefact Fund, the Foundation was reactivated and, with the support of the Swiss government, the Culture for Democracy project was launched. Katarina Nikolić won the competition for a contemporary engaged play with the play “Window“. The award was given at the Heartefact Festival held in Endžio Hub, and the stage reading was performed by second-year acting students at the Faculty of Dramatic Arts in Belgrade in the class of Marija Milošević. Consultations with Peace Nexus Foundation were held and a new strategic plan for the period 2022-2025 was established. In September, the Pride Theater Festival was organized, featuring Kosovo artist Agon Rexehpi, who was given a residency as part of the Reconnection 2.0 program. Within the same program, the book “Notes of the Worm Smolinski ” by Kosovo author Azem Deliju was translated, published, and promoted at the Heartefact Festival in December. The Leadership Program was organized for about 20 young leaders from the Western Balkans, and within the Forum Europe project, 10 debates were organized that dealt with key social problems facing all countries in the region. The organisation of speed dating as a form of networking in virtual space and overcoming physical limitations due to the virus pandemic continued. The realization of the Kosovo School program continued, through which 33 participants passed during the year, and due to the COVID-19 virus pandemic, one visit to Pristina was organized. The project “Media Voices” was realized, which aimed to connect young people from Kosovo and Serbia, who created a series of podcasts on various topics that connect the two societies. 32 episodes of the podcast “Pleasure in the text” were published and the performances “Kiddo”, “Finger”, “October the 6th” and “Uncle Vanya” continued.
2020
Benjamin Bajramović won the competition for contemporary engaged drama with the play “Brothel Eden”, and the stage reading was performed by students of the Academy of Arts from Sarajevo in the class of Professor Ermin Bravo. During the year, the realization of the “Future Epics” project was completed. Despite the difficulties due to the Covid-19 virus pandemic, which started in March, the premiere of the play “Intimacy” was held at the “Dubrovnik Summer Festival” starring Leon Lučev and Jelena Graovac. In cooperation with the National Theater from Niš, the play by Tisa Milić, “October the 6th” directed by Andrej Nosov, premiered. Although the Covid-19 virus pandemic has made travel difficult, the play “Kiddo” visited Priština and Ferizaj. Pride Theater Festival and Heartefact Festival were organized. The online platform Forum Europe has been organized more than 20 times, and Speed dating was used as a special interactive form to connect people during a pandemic. All performances produced by Heartefact were available online during the pandemic. Within the Kosovo School program, two seminars were organized, as well as a digital visit and other online events which adapted to the new reality in which we lived. A series of debates and online readings marked the 25th anniversary of the Srebrenica genocide.
2019
The premiere of “Uncle Vanya” by Chekhov, directed by Andrej Nosov, was held in Vršac, and the performances “The Ghosts”, “Finger” and “Kiddo” continued. The sculpture for the monument to Zoran Djindjic, the assassinated Prime Minister of the Republic of Serbia, was completed. The Heartefact Festival was organized, as well as the first Pride Theater Festival in Belgrade, which hosted performances from the United States, Great Britain, Kosovo and Serbia. In the competition for contemporary drama, Dino Pešut won with the drama “The Last Afterparty”. Manfred Beilharz, longtime director and founder of the Biennale’s Neue Stücke aus Europa, symbolically handed over the legacy of the Biennale to Heartefact, linking the event’s role in Europe to the Belgrade Biennale, which should continue its tradition. Within the NEW platform, master classes were organized by actress Mirjana Karanović and Dutch composer Vanessa Lann. Heartefact launched the Reconnection 2.0 project from Qendra Multimedia and established the “Kosovo School” program. Two symposiums were organized with partners from the Dubrovnik Summer Festival and the Tasca organization from Barcelona, as well as a master class by Biljana Srbljanović. The project “Public” was also realized, which analyzed and criticized the use of offensive language in the media space.
2018
The plays “Kiddo” directed by Andrej Nosov and “Shklovski: Energy of Delusion” directed by Branislava Stefanović premiered. The plays “The Ghosts”, “Finger” and the author’s project of Mirjana Karanović “Julija” were successfully performed. During the year, the realization of the Cathexis – Innovating Theatre as Event: The Spectator as Researcher project was completed. Another successful Heartefact Festival was organized. The play “Muscat Flowers Will Survive It All” by Iva Brdar won the competition for the best contemporary engaged play. Together with Heartefact partners, work continued on the Future Epics project. During the year, the NEW platform was launched, and Biljana Srbljanović, Tobias Veit (executive director of the Schaubine Theater in Berlin) and Ingrid Trobitz (intendant of the Residenz Theater) held their master classes. The conference “The Future of Performing Arts in Serbia ” was organized, which gathered representatives of institutions and representatives of the independent scene in one place and opened a mutual dialogue. The program “Children of the 90s’ ‘ and the work of the Remarker portal continued.
2017
The Remarker portal for art and politics was founded; the editorial board of the portal was gathered, podcasts and video materials were created, with the podcast “Pleasure in the text” by Biljana Srbljanović standing out. Heartefact supported and produced the author’s project of Mirjana Karanović “Julija”, which was premiered, and the play “The Ghosts” successfully continued to be performed. Mirko Ilić’s exhibition “Tolerance” on symbols of tolerance was organized, as well as a regional competition for the logo of tolerance. The project “Children of the 90s” was created and another Heartefact Festival was organized. Staša Bajac won the competition for contemporary drama with the play “This one will be different“. The performance “48 hours of Awakeness” was performed at the Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art in Rijeka.
2016
Mirza Skenderagić won the competition for the best contemporary engaged play with the play “Wake me up when it’s over“. The performance “48 hours of Awakeness” continued to be performed, as well as the performances “This grave is too small for me“, “Ghosts” and “Women cry too, don’t they?“. The “Festival of Tolerance” was renamed into the Heartefact Festival and organized in December. In cooperation with the Unstraight Museum in Stockholm, the exhibition “Life through the LGBT Eyes” was organized and curated by Nevena Negojević. The platform “Voices in Chaos” was created and a theatrical music concert by Irena Popović Dragović was organized. “Stranger” based on the motifs of Camus’ work of the same name and coreographed by Miloš Isailović was co-produced with the National Game Foundation. Vuk Bošković’s drama “The Remains” premiered at the “Nine” festival.
2015
Heartefact started this year with the transformation from a small to a medium-sized organization. Three premieres were held: “Werther: either you have hope or you dont have hope” directed by Andrej Nosov; the play by Vesna Perić “It Is Not Her Fault None of It Is Her Fault” directed by Andjelka Nikolić; Ibsen’s “The Ghosts” directed by Andrej Nosov. The plays “This grave is too small for me” based on the text by Biljana Srbaljanović, “A Tomb for Boris Davidovich” by Danilo Kiš directed by Ivica Buljan and “Hunger” by Andrej Nosov were performed. Heartefact participated in the Prague Quadrennial as part of the national selection of exhibitions curated by Mia David, which has been awarded a gold medal for initiating dialogue. Three exhibitions were organized, and “Srebrenica Today” was especially important, marking the 20th anniversary of the Srebrenica genocide. The European Task Force – a group of experts and activists for the European future of the region – has been launched. An exhibition of anti-Masonic posters was once again organized. The “Intruders” platform, which was launched together with the Transpond organization from Stockholm, continued its work. The book “Between Us” about the history of the LGBT community had its promotion throughout the region. In 2015, 14 grants were awarded and the philanthropic initiative “Art Friendly” was conceived. At the end of the year, the documentary “Gabriel” was made, which follows the life of an African migrant in Serbia. The film was never finished, and Gabriel left Serbia.
2014
The production of the play “This grave is too small for me” based on the play by Biljana Srbljanović, and directed by Dino Mustafić, for which a summer tour was organized, was completed. The play “A Tomb for Boris Davidovich” based on the book by Danilo Kiš, and directed by Ivica Buljan, had its premiere in the city of Ciridae in Italy at the “Mitellfest” festival. The plays “Hypermnesia” directed by Selma Spahić, “Bent” by Andrej Nosov, “Workers Die Singing” directed by Andjelka Nikolić, “Hunger” directed by Andrej Nosov and “Finger” directed by Ana Tomović continue to be performed. Two exhibitions were held: “Anti-Masonic Posters 1941-1942” and “Nothing about Anything” by Srdjan Ćešic. 12 grants were awarded. The Reconnection platform brought to an end small collaborative projects, and the Intruders platform continued to develop. The first Festival of Tolerance was organized, which later grew into the Heartefact Festival
2013
During the year, 31 large grants and 15 small grants were awarded. Selma Spahić’s “Hypemnesia“, “Workers Die Singing” based on the text by Olga Dimitrojević and directed by Andjelka Nikolić, “Bent” by Andrej Nosov, “Finger” by Doruntina Baša and directed by Ana Tomović, were all performed throughout the region and Europe. The play “Hunger“, an author’s project by Andrej Nosov and Vuk Bošković, was premiered. The exhibition “Bogujevci – visual history” was organized in cooperation with the Cultural Center of Belgrade. The Reconnection platform actively worked on connecting Kosovo and Serbia.
2012
The premiere of two plays: “Finger” by Doruntina Baša, directed by Ana Tomović and “Scratching or How my grandmother killed herself” by Tanja Šljivar, directed by Selma Spahić in collaboration with Bitef Theater and the Bosnian National Theater in Zenica. Also, the play “Bent” directed by Andrej Nosov had its premiere at the Bitef Theater. 18 small grants were awarded. The plays “Hypermnesia” and “Workers Die Singing” continue to be performed and won 7 Sterija Awards, while other Heartefact productions have won over 20 awards at various festivals in the country and across Europe. Together with the Youth Initiative for Human Rights, Sarajevo Days were organized in Belgrade, and the Reconnection program continued to support exchanges between Belgrade and Pristina. The play “Hypermnesia” was a guest at the Kosovo National Theater as the first play from Serbia after 20 years. Vesna Perić won the competition for the best contemporary engaged drama text with the drama “It Is Not Her Fault None of It Is Her Fault“.
2011
The play “Hypemnesia” directed by Selma Spahić premiered. Doruntina Basha won the competition for the best contemporary engaged play with the play “Finger”. Heartefact, together with the Youth Initiative for Human Rights, organized the Days of Sarajevo. Olga Dimitrijević’s drama “Workers Die Singing” directed by Andjelka Nikolić was premiered. Heartefact has established strategic cooperation with Bitef Theater in order to promote contemporary drama texts. A strategic partnership has been established with the Ilija Kolorca Endowment. The implementation of the Reconnection program continued, through which about 150 representatives of the media, civil society organizations and artists from the two societies participated in over 10 visits, and Heartefact awarded 15 small grants and organized the first Summer production school.
2010
Heartefact organized the Days of Sarajevo with the Youth Initiative for Human Rights, and the stage readings of the three most successful pieces from the competition whose topic was the relationship between Belgrade and Sarajevo. The first competition for the best contemporary engaged drama text was held, and the winner of the competition was Olga Dimitrijević with the text “Workers die singing“. Heartefact helped the artist Milica Tomić in the realization of the author’s project “Four Faces of Omarska“. A regional conference on regional cooperation of art organizations was organized within the MESS theater festival. Heartefact awarded the first 8 grants. The Reconnection platform for cooperation between Kosovo and Serbia was established and 12 visits were organized for various actors. For the first time an initiative was launched for a play from the National Theater in Pristina to be performed in Belgrade, in Atelje 212, but due to the impossibility of reaching an agreement on how to present the guests from Pristina, the performance was canceled. Heartefact office opened in Pristina.
2009
In early July 2009, after leaving the Youth Initiative for Human Rights, Andrej Nosov founded the Heartefact Fund as a regional foundation that supports the creation of a common cultural space in the Western Balkans and critical artistic practice. In the first year of its existence, Heartefact supported 5 projects of art organizations and launched its operational work.