Roma Futuristic Futures – A Glimpse into the RJSaK ARCHIVE
Breaking pieces out of the quarry of past violence and opening up spaces: the Roma Jam Session art Kollektiv (RJSaK) in Zurich questioned rigid images of Roma communities over many years. The collective sought a practice in the spaces of art and activism by challenging the system of G L A M (Galleries, Libraries, Archives, Museums).
The Roma Jam Session art collective (RJSaK) was active from 2013 to 2023. I am very grateful to Mustafa Asan aka RR Marki († 2022) and Milena Petrovic for our collaboration, the mutual learning, exchange of knowledge and creative energies.
We founded an association and sought our path, working with acting, typography, language, movement, dance and sound to create performative interventions. Our goal was to break down the fossilized images of the Rom*nja in our societies and to find new artistic forms shedding a light on untold Swiss history and beyond. As a transnational group with origins in Macedonia, Serbia, and Switzerland, we brought together different historical, contemporary and aesthetic experiences. Over the past ten years, we have created a body of work that has been received and honored in the arts and politics. Following the release of our publication “Morphing the Roma Label” (2022) and the unexpected death of RR Marki, the collective was faced with the task of making important decisions to protect our work and make it permanently available to society. After the reception of the recognition grant for cultural participation 2023, RJSaK decided to transform and build RJSaK ARCHIVE. This archive consists of a website, artefacts from various performances (videos and costumes), and posters.
RJSaK ARCHIVE is alive and present in contemporary institutions and alternative art spaces. As the archivist and former artistic director of the RJSaK I am thrilled to announce that the poster series “Open Roma Culture” will be shown in the international group show “Museum Yet to Be” at MoCA Museum of Contemporary Art Montenegro in December 2025.
– Mo Diener
The founding Members of RJSaK met at Shedhalle in 2013 during “Die Schweiz ist keine Insel, Teil 1 : In lästiger Gesellschaft.”
Mo Diener (Switzerland)
Mo Diener is a performance and media artist whose practice engages transdisciplinary methodologies across performance, visual media, anthropology, and cultural studies. Since discovering her Roma/Sinti ancestry in 2009, her work has turned toward social and forensic archives, cultural memory, and eco-feminist strategies of historiography and community building. Active since the 1990s, she has developed performances, interventions, video works, and assemblages presented in Switzerland and internationally. In 2013 she co-founded the Roma Jam Session art Kollektiv (RJSaK) with RR Marki and Milena Petrovic, serving as artistic director for a decade and advancing collaborative forms of artistic research and situated performance that challenge dominant European narratives. Following the passing of RR Marki in 2022, she became custodian of the RJSaK ARCHIVE, responsible for its curatorial care, digital presence, and critical visibility. Her current research articulates Indigenous I Roma I Eco-Feminist Futurisms within contemporary art and cultural discourse.
RR Marki (Switzerland I North Macedonia)
RR Marki was a Roma artist and activist whose work engaged with historical and socio-political issues concerning the visibility of Roma art and culture in Europe. Born in Skopje, he graduated from the Technical University in his hometown before moving to Zurich, where he studied at the F+F School of Art and Design and worked as a radio presenter for Radio Lora Romanes. In 2011, he visited and reported with Radio Lora Romanes, on the exhibition Call the Witness, the second Roma Pavilion organized by artistic director Maria Hlavajova (original idea and title by curator Suzana Milevska) as a parallel event of the 54th Venice Biennale (ILLUMInations, curated by Bice Curiger). In 2013, he co-founded the Roma Jam Session art Kollektiv (RJSaK) with artist Mo Diener and actress Milena Petrovic.RR Marki passed away in Zurich in December 2022.
Milena Petrovic (Switzerland I Austria I Serbia)
Milena Petrovic is a trained actress who has worked across film, theater, and radio. She has performed at the Schauspielhaus Zurich, Maxim Theater, and in independent film projects as well as for Swiss television and Radio Lora (2014–2015). From 2010 to 2015, she was a member of the Maxim Theater Company, renowned in German-speaking Switzerland for its socially critical productions. During this time, she appeared in acclaimed plays such as Kreis Fear, Schweizerpass Superstar, KissKill KillKiss, and Spielt Gott Fussball. Together with Mustafa Asan and Mo Diener, Milena Petrovic co-founded the Roma Jam Session art Kollektiv (RJSaK). Following the passing of RR Marki and the dissolution of the collective, she returned to her work as an actress.
