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Unfixed Galaxies (2018–2024) by Sema Bekirovic consists of analogue photographic prints created using dust collected from the vacuum cleaners at the Stedelijk Museum. The dust, containing traces of visitors, staff, and artworks, was placed on photographic paper, exposed, developed, but left unfixed. Displayed behind red plexiglass to slow the fading process, the images remain light-sensitive and will eventually disappear if exposed to daylight. The work emphasizes the transience of both people and artworks, highlighting the intimate material traces left behind in shared museum spaces.

Installation | Photography

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Unfixed Galaxies (framed)

Once an Alien (2023) is a science-fiction documentary feature by visual artist Sema Bekirovic that follows her 81-year-old father, Mirza Bekirović, on a journey through Bosnia and Herzegovina in a camper.

Film

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Once an Alien

Curatorial | Installation | Publication

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Reading by Osmosis/ Nature interprets Us

All That Is Solid (2021) by Sema Bekirovic is an outdoor installation created for Into Nature Drenthe. The work consists of a 140×140 cm ball made of 2,300 kg of sugar, glucose, and food coloring, tested and approved by Staatsbosbeheer ecologists. Placed in a nature reserve, the sugar ball slowly transforms as it is eroded by rain and consumed by insects. The piece explores impermanence, the interaction between human-made materials and natural processes, and the passage of time in ecological environments.

Installation | Video

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All that is Solid

Echoes of the Sun (2022) by Sema Bekirovic and Jan-Pieter Karper — white A2 sheets printed in white ink that reveal a sun image over time when exposed to sunlight.

Installation | Photography

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Echoes of the Sun

In Of Fire, Sema Bekirovic uses a thermal imaging camera to film artist Xu XueQin sculpting a clay dragon. The shifting heat patterns reveal an intimate energy exchange between artist and artwork

Video

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Of Fire

For Every Atom (2024) by Sema Bekirovic — artist book and museum guide treated with forensic powder to reveal traces of museum visitors.

Publication

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For Every Atom

For the Birds (2020) by Sema Bekirovic — installation in which skylights are covered with 200 kg of birdseed, allowing birds to determine how much sunlight enters the exhibition space.

Installation

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For the Birds

still from the 16 mm film wonderturner by sema bekirovic. an art film about the practise of panplaying or tepsijanj in bosnia and herzegovina

Film | Video

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Wonder Turner

Übersetzungen 03 (Brecht) (2020) by Sema Bekirovic is a video installation developed during the Dialogfelder residency in Chemnitz, Germany. The work stems from a workshop in which the artist invited passersby to trace figures on a transparent plastic sheet placed over the GDR-era relief Lobgedichte, created by various artists and based on Bertolt Brecht’s praise poems. The act of tracing becomes a gesture of reinterpretation and dialogue—an interaction between past and present, individual and collective memory. The piece is part of a broader series of collaborative works exploring translation, historical continuity, and the reactivation of socialist-era public art.

Installation | Video | Workshop

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Übersetzungen

Installation | Sculpture

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Driftwood

Museum Dust (2024) by Sema Bekirovic — perfume made from dust collected from the Fries Museum’s vacuum cleaners, dispersed through a scent dispenser.

Perfume

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Museum Dust

Sculptures for Ants (2019) by Sema Bekirovic and Jan-Pieter Karper — installation and workshop creating miniature sculptures for ants during the Into The Great Wide Open festival.

Installation | Video

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Sculptures for the Ants

The Radiance of Sensible Heat (02) (2016) by Sema Bekirovic — three-channel thermal video installation showing a hand transferring heat to plaster sculptures at the Rijksakademie.

Video

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The Radiance of Sensible Heat

Study in Circular Motion (2016) by Sema Bekirovic — altered clock moving a 50-cent coin endlessly in circular motion.

Sculpture

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Study In Circular Motion

Men of Steel, Men of Stone (2017–ongoing) by Sema Bekirovic — 16mm film showing the artist washing and covering statues of Dutch colonial heroes with soap and mud.

Film | Installation | Video

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Men of Steel, Men of Stone

Untitled (Honeycombs) (2011) by Sema Bekirovic — household objects placed inside beehives and transformed by bees building honeycomb around them.

Installation | Sculpture

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Untitled (Honeycombs)

Silicone cast artwork “Übersetzungen” by Sema Bekirovic, after Johann Belz’s 1976 relief Kampf und Sieg der revolutionären Deutschen Arbeiterklasse in Chemnitz, GDR.

Installation | Sculpture

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Übersetzungen (Belz)

The Others (2008–2011) by Sema Bekirovic — three-hour video showing forest animals eating a picnic, filmed with a surveillance camera.

Video

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The Others

In Communion of Goods (2016) by Sema Bekirovic — installation using a compressor and copper tubing that accumulates ice from ambient humidity.

Installation | Sculpture

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In Communion of Goods

Organon (2018) by Sema Bekirovic — installation of 60 handmade thermometers forming a shifting line drawing through fluctuating temperature.

Installation | Sculpture

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Organon

Borrowed Time, HD video (11 min, 2014/2015) by Sema Bekirovic. The video explores a single, prolonged breath, starring freediver Jorrit Bruinsma.

Video

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Borrowed Time

The International Forest (2014–ongoing) by Sema Bekirovic — collection of branches and leaves transported across borders by mail and air travel as part of a performative exploration of mobility and ecology.

Installation | Sculpture

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The International Forest

sema bekirovic flying carpet

Installation | Video

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Flying Carpet

Event Horizon HD video, 4 min, 2010. A landscape is gradually engulfed by an approaching black hole.

Installation | Video

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Event Horizon

sema bekirovic

Photography | Publication | Slideshow

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Koet

Kubus 02 (2017) by Sema Bekirovic is a 15 × 15 × 15 cm handmade cube constructed from plexiglass and glue, coated with forensic fingerprint powder known as “special gold.” The artist instructed the factory workers who assembled the cube not to wear gloves, preserving their fingerprints and smudges on its surface. By later applying the forensic powder, Bekirovic revealed the cube’s hidden history—the physical traces of those who made it. The work serves both as an homage to unseen labor and a reminder that we inevitably leave traces of ourselves behind.

Installation | Sculpture

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Kubus

Grid, by sema bekirovic SD video, 19 min, 2006. Three snails crawl across a drawing of a grid on paper, making their own slime-trail-drawing in the process

Video

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Grid

Every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you (2017) by Sema Bekirovic — wall installation using bone glue illuminated by UV light to reveal natural luminescence

Installation

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Every atom belonging to me ….

Fire Sequence, by sema bekirovic HD video, 5:55 min, 2013. A flame is “passed on” through a series of small objects, ranging from reproductions of paintings to miniature furniture.

Video

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Fire Sequence

sema bekirovic

Video

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Kalverstraat

Shoes HD video, 1:20 min, 2015. Shoes, sema bekirovic HD video, 1:20 min, 2015. A pair of shoes is exposed to a chemical reaction (combustion of mercury(II) thiocyanate) , causing them to sprout a yellowish growth. It looks as though the shoes are trying (and failing) to “grow” a wearer.

Video

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Shoes

Unfixed Galaxies (2013–2017) by Sema Bekirovic — unfixed analogue photograms of galaxies displayed in a red-lit, lightproof room.

Installation | Photography

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Unfixed Galaxies

Untitled (2009–2010) by sema bekirovic, is a short video in which ants carry small letters cut from newspapers, arranging them by chance into fleeting, accidental words.

Video

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Untitled (Ants)

Snowflake (2012) by sema bekirovic, is a photographic experiment in which an image of a snowflake is developed but intentionally left unfixed, leaving it sensitive to light and time. The image can only be seen by peering beneath a piece of black cloth — an act that paradoxically exposes it to light and initiates its gradual transformation. T

Installation | Photography

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Snowflake

sema bekirovic

Installation | Photography

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Untitled (Shelves)

Waterspiegels Mirrors, 300cm x 600 cm, by sema bekirovic, underwater construction A mirrored object is fixed just beneath the water surface. The flow of the water above it makes the object appear to shimmer.

Installation

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Waterspiegel

Between My Head And The Sky HDV video, 1:36, by sema, Registration of a knife in free fall. comissioned by MTV and MOMA PS1

Video

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Between My Head And The Sky

Traces by Sema Bekirovic — found objects treated with forensic powder and illuminated with UV light to reveal fingerprints and smudges.

Installation | Photography

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Traces

Combustions (2014–2015) is a photographic series by Sema Bekirovic in which analogue photographic paper is exposed through burning, then developed using traditional methods. The resulting images reveal both the photographic representation and the physical marks of the combustion itself. By allowing the paper to “expose itself,” the work emphasizes materiality, transformation, and the interplay between destruction and image-making. The series was produced in variable sizes, highlighting the experimental and process-oriented nature of the practice.

Photography

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Combustions

How to stop falling by sema bekirovic HD video, 1:30 min, 2007/2008 Large styrofoam letters dropped off the top of an office building.

Video

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How to stop falling

Video

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Book

Space Piece, sculpture by sema bekirovic Object, 20x15x4 cm, 2013, Spectacle frame forged from a meteorite.

Sculpture

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Space Piece

sema bekirovic

Video

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Stuff

A Story Digested By Insects by sema bekirovic. Insect feces in envelope, 6×4 cm, 2014 A story that I wrote on paper and then fed to some bugs. The remains, scrambled by the bugs’ digestive tracts, where exhibited in a tiny envelop.

Sculpture

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A Story Digested By Insects

sema bekirovic, birds of prey, video, 2005

Video

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Birds of Prey

Enquiry by Sema Bekirovic, 2014. E-mail correspondence displayed as an artwork. For the exhibition ‘Superposition,’ the artist attempted to obtain Maurizio Cattelan’s ‘Untitled (Denunzia),’ a work based on a police report of a stolen invisible art piece. When the work could not be included, Bekirovic exhibited her correspondence with the gallery instead.”

Curatorial | Writing

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Enquiry

Untitled (Metal Ball) by Sema Bekirovic, 2008. 80×80×80 cm, metal and electronics. A spherical object with a destructive inner mechanism, slowly destroying itself from the inside out.

Installation | Sculpture

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Untitled (metal ball)

photo sequence by sema bekirovic, a picture of a wave is sinking in water

Photography

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A selection of photo works

sema bekirovic

Installation

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World Lines