Tamara Obrovac is a prominent name on the Croatian contemporary and a significant performer on the world jazz scene. Tamara connects Istrian tradition and jazz through musical narratives, enchanting the audience with her every tone and a unique interpretation of emotions.

Her musical project, ‘Apoxyomenos recomposed’, for which Sonda signed the visual identity, is the product of a collaboration between Tamara and the Italian pianist Stefano Battaglia. The project is based on compositions from Euripides’ ‘The Trojan Women’, an anti-war drama that resonates with the poignant stories of women going through consequences of the Trojan War, and which Tamara Obrovac composed for the ballet “Apoxiomenos” performed by the Croatian National Theater in Zagreb in 2017. Tamara’s compositions were arranged and reharmonized by Stefano Battaglia, and they received the final form during their joint work in Siena at the Accademia musicale Chigiana in the fall of 2022, when they were recorded. The songs’ lyrics are in ancient Greek, and are based on fragments of the verses of ‘The Trojan Women’ which were chosen for the ballet performance by playwright Lada Kaštelan. The artistic vision of the project is inspired by Apoxyomenos, a bronze statue of a young athlete found in the Lošinj seas, which in this context narrates of the metaphysics of the sea as a tomb, but at the same time as the source and continuation of life.

Sonda, entrusted with the visual expression of this deep and intertwined narrative, set out on a journey of research into the common symbolism of ‘The Trojan women’ and Apoxyomenos. As inspired by Tamara’s poems, the project conveys the inner and emotional space of the poems, where the sea symbolizes the border between the world of the living and the dead, the real and the imaginary. In the conceptualization of the visual identity, the shape of the circle is used as a basic element that reflects the continuity and infinity of life. At the same time, the contrast between clear and fuzzy parts is key in the concept, being it the graphic representation of the layers of the sea, where the depths are integrated with a blurred and unclear representation, and the surface brings sharpness and clarity. All this is illustrating the complexity and unpredictability of the human journey through life. A minimalistic approach to graphics was used because the songs themselves are almost minimalistic in their expressiveness. In this visual symphony, each design element is harmonized to echo the deep emotional resonances of the sea, prompting reflections on the human experience, loss and the necessity of transformation, eternal motion and endless cycles of life and art, identical to the movement of the sea…

Creative direction/Design: Sean Poropat, Jelena Fiškuš, Studio Sonda
Aleksandar Živanov/Design/Studio Sonda
Sara Bažon/Account Executive/Studio Sonda
CLIENT: Tamara Obrovac
VISUAL ELEMENTS: Ivan Obrovac