ISOLA BELLA
- Artist: Danica Dakic
- Date: 2007–8
- Medium: Graphite, ink and coloured pencil on paper, digital prints on paper, paper masks and video, projection, colour and sound (stereo)
- Dimensions: Overall display dimensions variable
- Museum: Tate Modern
- Collection record: Tate Modern website
Listen to the free audio guide
About this artwork
This is the “Beautiful Island” by Danica Dakic. It’s a single‑channel video projection that plays in a dim, sound‑sealed room with a grey carpet. Outside, you’ll see props from the film—props that the forty young residents of a Bosnian care home actually used—and three posters that shout the title against a backdrop of blue sky and palm trees. The film runs a little over nineteen minutes and was shot at the Home for the Protection of Children and Youth in Pazaric, near Sarajevo.
The performance is unscripted: the residents themselves act, speak, dance, and improvise, all while wearing ordinary clothes and paper Victorian‑style masks. The set is a historic wallpaper that shows a “beautiful island,” hinting at a past untouched by the Balkan wars. The piece blends real stories of disability and mental health with the residents’ own fantasies—like dreaming of becoming a UN legal expert—creating a utopian, almost dream‑like narrative that blurs reality and imagination. It’s a powerful example of Dakic’s participatory approach, turning marginalized voices into the very fabric of the artwork.
See it in person
ISOLA BELLA is in the collection of Tate Modern on Bankside, London — free to enter. Point your phone at any artwork there and audioguide.london plays a free audio guide in six languages — no app download needed.
