With its theme Togetherness, during three colourful days filled with events, Smoqua gathered hundreds of artists, activists, collectives, organisations and friends from Croatia and abroad. We celebrated queer and feminist culture, as well as the strength of our resilience, the stories we carry and the big anniversary: 25 years of LORI! And while we are sitting in the office (which is in a mess – because now we have to clean everything up! 😂) and retelling what happened, laughing, we are thinking about all the people who made this celebration so wonderful – THANK YOU, PEOPLE, THANK YOU SO MUCH!
Solidarity knows no boundaries!!
It's touching how many people from LORI’s different eras came from all around to celebrate its birthday with us – thank you, Ari, Jay, Seka and all the wonderful people who came with you; Jupiter, the crew from Slovenia, the crew from Vienna… When it got (financially) tough this winter, Smoqua got enriched with valuable knowledge from our friends from Brussels, Hamburg, Bosnia and Herzegovina and all over Balkan: Sarajevo Open Centre, European Center for Digital Action, ERA LGBTI and Foundation CURE, Sonja - came, held workshops, supported the community.
Smoqua volunteers always hold a special place in our review because really, without them the festival would be soulless. More than 20 people handed out flyers, climbed walls to hang posters, carried bags, hosted people, dealt with lunches, safety, people’s wellbeing, made sure posts went up on time, translated, made last minute film subtitles, made stickers (Mateja and Jelena: they’re great!) – really there is nothing our volunteers didn’t do. Always there for everyone, you make us laugh and when it gets rough, we know we can count on you – thank you for everything! 😊
Thank you Erin&Tina for being great panel moderators, Emina Hermann and Milena Biber for ‘jumping in last second”, Palach, O.K Gallery, SKC Gallery, Circolo, Rock pub, Austrian Culture Forum Zagreb, SRCE VBZ bookstore and organisations SOS Rijeka, Proces, Delta, Domino for all sorts of support, as well as and Rijeka for hanging our festival and rainbow flags along Korzo street.
Tudor vina and Suza liquors made Smoqua sweet again this year: the crowd loves you, you have a fan base. 😉 We thank Croatian Railways for a return ticket discount and Adria Print who helped us with cool new stickers alongside flyers and posters. Menstrual cups by Intimina and LELO intimate accessories got given away as part of the game Queer mystery and the quiz “Weakest Barbie” and they were also handed out at our info booth so as many people as possible could try out these valuable gadgets. 😁
And we can’t possibly leave this out – mom Zlata’s cake.🍰
Danijela’s mom made a LORI birthday cake with lots of love and patience so this is for her: “The middle crust wasn’t dry – everything was sweet enough – Thank you, Mom!”“. ❤️
Here is how the festival went
The sun hit the rainbow and Smoqua flags on Korzo on Thursday which means the crew is gathering: Smoqua is starting. Youth mingled in front of Palach on the Youth Tiramol and hung some of their ideas for their local community. Amina from Sarajevo Open Centre spoke about youth in Bosnia and Herzegovina and teams investigated who stole the queer agenda as part of Alex’s “Queer mystery”.That is also part of our new project ReActivate yourself and we are looking forward to it continuing. After the great workshop about the possibilities of fundraising organisation with experts from ECDA followed the panel “LGBTIQ+ Inclusivity in the Workplace”. It’s great that the VBZ bookshop space was packed: people from institutions, unions, University of Rijeka and different firms wanted to hear how IKEA, Decathlon and K-Zone build safe working spaces for their employees and society.
The night was reserved for the "24 BACI (24 KISSES)" exhibition opening in O.K. Gallery with the crew from Proces and finished with a strong performance of the „Infinite Archive #1 Unstoppable“ - an Argentinian and Croatian queer story that moved us and touched everyone in Palach which was filled with people.
The second day of the festival was dedicated to celebrating togetherness and LORI’s 25th birthday.
With the workshop “Your DRAG-est Self” and “Let Our Voices Be Heard!” with Drag Kokošinjac and Le Zbor, voices literally vibrated through the whole Kružna street! Judith Lava opened the exhibition “Lili Celebrates Feminist Joy” which raised eyebrows and caused a stir in our town even before it started. The exhibition opening was followed by a photo session on Korzo which of course included a dose of laughter. First some of the people went to the left, the others with the flags to the right, then our photographer Tanja Kanazir rearranged us, BUT we have a memento: a photo underneath the Korzo rainbow for all of times. 🌈
Well, then the celebration moved to Circolo: there we laughed, cried and remembered the first steps in our lesbian* and feminist battles while we opened the festival and afterwards talked with Emina, Danijela, Elena and Milena and premiered the documentary film “25 Years of LORI” by director Noah Kraljević. The movie made us remember why we do what we do, what wonderful people we have around us and how far we’ve come. Thank you, Noah, we are already talking about how we will visit more festivals together. 😎
The third day was filled with queer creativity and gentleness as well as with the long-awaited Queer-UP! Party (after all, it was International Coming Out Day). Alongside Sonja Schelper we talked about joy in older age and the possibilities of communal living – we were looking for extra chairs because it seems all lesbians want to live together (it’s not surprising is it? 😂😊), as well as at Queer Hobby Tea Party with Korin where we crocheted, drew and played instruments (we forgot the name of the instrument again – Sss?).🎵 We made our own body scrub with Foundation CURE and practiced resistance through expressive art with Jamie and Irene.
The evening, the evening was the embodiment of new connections – first there was an opening of a wonderful exhibition “Queer Moments in Lost Spaces” in Circolo by Barbara Essl – we were fascinated by her photos and the story where queer people make spaces “alive”. And then the icing on the cake – Queer-UP! Party.
A special thank you to VINS Vladarice for gifting us songs only they know how to perform like that and Le Zbor prepared for months for this performance and sang for our birthday celebration from their hearts. We will never forget how we translated songs, even: “Riječke, najbolje su čke, čke…“ (Rijeka *** are the best) to our friends from abroad. 😂
Drag hens presented us with plenty remarkable performances and messages – it was an explosion of charm, laughter and art. DJ Luna is a complete gem on the Croatian queer scene, and we will always be happy to invite her – good job to her – and good job to everyone for a touching and successful party. 😍
We are starting to plan a new programme and Smoqua’s anniversary right away – the next one is a big one. We will see all of you lovely people next year – with even more love, freedom and queer joy! 💜
