Dragana Jurišić’s documentary feature debut The Balkan Cowboy is set to receive its world premiere in the Documentary Film Competition at the 32nd Sarajevo Film Festival, which runs August 14–21.
Ahead of the premiere, Dublin’s Invisible Thread Films and Zagreb’s Restart have unveiled the film’s hand-drawn poster, created by artist David Rooney in collaboration with designer Niall McCormack.
The film follows Jurišić to Bijeljina, Bosnia and Herzegovina, in search of the story and legacy of cult Yugoslav Western filmmaker Hari Džekson, also known as Harry Jackson. A childhood hero and family friend of the director, Džekson made amateur Westerns with local communities during the 1970s and 1980s, transforming the landscape around him into his own cinematic frontier.
Jurišić arrives with the intention of staging a short film in Džekson’s style. Working with the local community, she meets his relatives and former collaborators as well as present-day residents of Bijeljina. Their recollections gradually recover an image of the town before the war while revealing the place it has become. What begins as a search for a nearly mythical filmmaker expands into an exploration of how conflict marked Džekson, Jurišić, and the community itself, and whether the cowboy spirit that animated his films can still be found there.
The newly revealed artwork draws directly on that meeting of film history and Western mythology. Rooney rendered the illustration in scraperboard, a process in which an artist cuts through an inked surface to expose the light beneath. McCormack developed the poster’s typography and overall design.
“I grew up reading graphic novels, and during my research I found that Hari Džekson often used them as pre-made storyboards for his Westerns, so I always wanted the poster to be illustrated,” Jurišić says. “I have admired David Rooney’s work from afar for a long time. He uses a technique called scraperboard, where you scrape through an ink-covered surface to reveal the light beneath. Conceptually, the scraperboard technique he uses fits the film’s idea of scraping away darkness to reveal an image.
“Niall McCormack is a great graphic designer with whom I had the pleasure of working on my last book, Her Own. His attention to detail and his knowledge of typography are unparalleled. When an opportunity to work together again arose, I had to take it.” In Rooney’s image, Jurišić becomes the figure who illuminates the landscape, an investigator stepping into the visual language of the Western while directing light toward a difficult chapter of recent history.
“As chance would have it, I was already a little familiar with the Yugoslav Western genre of the film’s era and was deeply moved by Dragana’s powerful work,” Rooney says. “The idea of depicting her in the poster to illuminate this landscape came to me very quickly. I was inspired by the fact that she shines a light on a dark passage of recent history while simultaneously expressing the universal love of the cowboy hero and the enduring struggle between good and evil.
“Niall McCormack’s font choice was wonderfully bold and expressive, with the subtle flourish on the ‘t’ echoing both Dragana’s hat and the cowboy’s rope. I was delighted to collaborate with a designer whose work I have admired for many years.”
The poster will also feature in an exhibition of Jurišić’s photographic work made between 2022 and 2025 while scouting locations, casting, and filming The Balkan Cowboy. Hosted by the Embassy of Ireland in Sarajevo, the exhibition opens August 14 in the Botanical Garden of the National Museum of Bosnia and Herzegovina, coinciding with the opening day of the festival.
Official synopsis: Artist Dragana Jurišić travels to the town of Bijeljina, Bosnia and Herzegovina, in search of the mythical cult Western director Hari Džekson (Harry Jackson). In an attempt to uncover the story of Džekson’s life and legacy, Jurišić embarks on making a Western with the local community. She meets his former collaborators, family members, and local residents, piecing together memories of Džekson’s town before the war and getting to know its inhabitants today. The resulting documentary becomes an exploration of the impact of war on Džekson, Jurišić herself, and the town. It also asks whether the spirit of Hari Džekson still exists today.
Poster artwork: © Invisible Thread Films and Restart.