PROLOGUE

For more than four decades Ćiril Ćiro Raič has been depicting Herzegovina through photographs. The problem appears when, out of the abundance of his photographic material, you ought to select a framework representing Herzegovina. But before doing that one should explain what it is that Herzegovina is represented by. Here it is described in the quadrilateral Trebinje - Livno - Šćit - Gacko. Some might object to Livno and Tomislav Grad being parts of Herzegovina in the tradition-al and geographic sense. Yet, we think it is a territory with very similar history, Mediterranean features and ethnological characteristics, which may, in a more general evaluation, be thought of as the hinterland of the Croatian litoral from Split to Dubrovnik.

So, how is Herzegovina conceived in Raič š objective?

The pictures are arranged in a chronological order: first prehistory, then Roman times, early Christianity, Middle Ages, Oriental times and finally Venetian times. In the said periods the most important, the best known, the most valuable, the most interesting, the most picturesque and most photogenic was singled out Who does not know that hill-forts and cairns are the most glorious remains from prehistory, epitaphs from the Roman times, stećci from the Middle Ages and clock-towers from the Oriental times? The second big section of Herzegovina is its architecture, from bridges and streets to religious buildings of all confessions. It is the country and the life in the country that Raič devoted most of his photographs, for after all Herzegovina is a rural environment Many of the photos are witnesses of a time that has vanished before our eyes - where are now stamping-mills, water mills, hearths, solidarity group works, carvings, mountain-dwelling...? The nature from Ćiro's laboratory smells of the profusion of landscapes, fields, springs, waterfalls, rocks and caves. Neither were forgotten paintings, books, costumes, folk-music, economy, sports, and everything that used to make the life in the rocky and sunny Herzegovina.

Viewed with the eyes of statistics, Herzegovina is represented through 32 major thematic units and 116 themes. An effort was made to present the most important motifs from all the twenty municipalities, here more, there less, for some municipalities are small, others really big - over one thou-sand square kilometers. It is only logical that the prehistoric habitats should be near caves above rivers, Roman settlements and camps in the plains, and the medieval towers on hilltops.

When selecting the photographs representing Herzegovina, we have intentionally skipped over the pictures from the 1991 - 1995 war period. And that for several reasons. In the recent years quite a lot of monographs and hooks have come out dealing with war themes: genocides, culturocides, urbicides, destroyed religious buildings and slaughter of innocent people. Due to war operations many of the places were not accessible to Raič. This would narrow and greatly reduce the selection and even representation of places resulting in bias due to lack of material and misinterpretation of facts. The selection made here represents Herzegovina through a multi-layered past, various rules, clash of worlds, cultures, religions, scripts, ideas, raptures, rebellions and hunger; a Hercegovina through water, rocks, flower and birds.

Herzegovina in the object lens is a life work of Ćiril Raič. There has been no like work so far. The question is whether there is going to he any in the future either. Yet, we can recall A.B. Šimić and say with him that Herzegovina is a painting in the sky.