Evon O. Imperfect Light

Inat Kuća – The House of Spite, Sarajevo

Inat Kuća – Spite House

I didn’t take this photograph because the building was beautiful – though it is. I took it because of the story it carries.

This is Inat Kuća, the “House of Spite” – a name born from defiance. When the Austro-Hungarian authorities planned to build the City Hall across the river, a stubborn houseowner refused to move unless they relocated his house, brick by brick, to the other side. They did. And he watched it rise from across the Miljačka, his spite immortalized in wood and stone.

I was drawn to the green bay window jutting out like a jawline, unbothered and proud. The sun carved shadows across its face, as if underlining the house’s character. I didn’t edit those lines away. I wanted the grit. The texture. The unapologetic presence.

In that moment, the house reminded me of Bosnia itself: unyielding, poetic, and full of stories that begin with resistance and end in resilience.

This post is part of the “Imperfect Light” series – you can read the introduction here.

Evon O. Imperfect Light

Vječna vatra – The Eternal Flame, Sarajevo

Vječna vatra – The Eternal Flame

I stood before the flame and couldn’t move.

It flickered not with fury, but with memory. The wind teased it, the traffic rushed behind me, but the fire held steady – unyielding, quiet, alive. Just like Sarajevo.

This is the Vječna vatra, the Eternal Flame, lit in 1946 to honour the liberators of the city after Wolrd War II. The inscription behind it speaks of unity – of Bosniaks, Croats, Serbs, Jews, and all who fought side by side. It’s a language of defiance and remembrance, written in stone and fire.

I took this photo not just to document a monument, but to preserve a moment: the tenderness of the wilted flowers, the scarred marble, they way the flame dared to glow even in daylight. In a city that has known both liberation and siege, this flame speaks a truth beyond politics.

It says:

We remember.

We endure.

We remain.

This image is a tribute to Sarajevo’s layered soul – burned, but not broken. And to the quiet fire that survives in every Bosnian heart.

This post is part of the “Imperfect Light” series – you can read the introduction here.