Artist Biography

Meet Realma — a Serbian-Chinese artist whose music transcends boundaries and defies categorization. With a thousand facets to her artistry, she weaves her music into sound spells that transport listeners to distant lands of the mind (hence the artist’s alias being a witchy pun on the word ‘realms’). Each song in Realma’s audiovisual universe is like a distinctive portal, brewing in a different genre with its own alchemy of influences. Whether it’s the moon-charmed landscape of her debut release ‘A Hint of Pink’, the noir cityscape of ‘Wandering’, the vibrant fairyland of her third release ‘Ashgrey Butterfly’, or the intergalactic action vistas of her newest track, ‘Down the Railway Spine’, Realma’s universe is like florid kaleidoscope for the wandering souls. Through her music, Realma invites the audience to embrace the magic of reverie and escape — to wander through neoteric sonic vistas and explore the depths of one’s imagination.

Accumulating printed and online coverage across global media (Rolling Stones India, Calvert Journal, Music Crowns, Zile si Nopti, Extravafrench, Indiefferential, Flex, Vreme, B92, Pink TV, etc.), Realma has presented herself as an exciting creative talent with a lot of promise for the future. While her eye-catching live sessions feature notable locations, including the UNESCO World Heritage Site, Felix Romuliana and Botanical Garden “Jevremovac”, Realma’s animated music videos, in collaboration with the award- winning artist Mihajlo Dragaš, have been a part of international film festivals, including Lift-Off Sessions, Flipbook Film Festival and Animest. Most recently, her performances have been described as “eclectic, distinct and multidisciplinary” and she’s entered the Top 3 semifinals in the MArte Live European art & music competition. Based upon Realma’s art songs, Realmaverse is her multi-genre audiovisual universe infused with engaging characters and their gripping stories. Realma and her collaborators are currently working on the exciting possibilities of shaping this musical universe into a powerful franchise and brand, with plans to extend the storyworlds into the comic, tabletop RPG and video game mediums.

Unveiling the person behind Realma

Hi, my name is Ariadna Vrljanović-Zhao and I’m the person behind Realma. I grew up in two disparate cultural environments and family conditions that encouraged a broad passion for arts and performing in me. This passion shaped me into a young polymodal artist with Serbian-Chinese roots that continually evolve through a range of different mediums. My explorations range from Chinese painting, calligraphy and poetry recitation, to the Western classical music (violin, guitar, piano, harmony, counterpoint, musical form and composition), dance (contemporary, Horton, tanztheater, ballet, butoh and burlesque), traditional Western drawing, oil-painting and stone carving, as well as martial arts (karate, wing chun, ninjutsu and yoga).

During my undergraduate studies in drama and film at the University of Kent, where I demonstrated distinguished results (two rotary awards, Vanessa Forrest prize and The Best Writing Prize), I focused my skills on ensemble devising and physical theatre with a focus on the psychophysical actor training and Michael Chekhov methodology. The practical side of drama allowed me to investigate various societal themes through narratives enriched with soundscapes and choreography, while the academic aspects led me to topics like counter historical outlook on body-mind relationship and reconceptualization of process/product binary from a post-psychophysical perspective on devising. Meanwhile, the film coursework taught me about cognitive theories, such as embodied cognition, as well as theories on narrativity like chronotopic narration. Outside of the university, I’ve completed Composition and Stylistic Techniques course at OCA (part of UCA) and attended multiple workshops on general movement efficiency, immersive theatre, Laban and Shakespeare, puppetry, mask, mime and many others. I have also completed the Singing and Songwriting course at PointBlank and Mixing/Mastering and Sound Engineering course in London, and have attended multiple summer intensives, including the Guildhall Summer School for Musical Theatre, Jasmin Vardimon Summer Intensive in Ashford and Duende physical theatre residency in Greece.

After returning back to Serbia due to the Covid-19 pandemic, I’ve started a new artistic journey, creating this audiovisual project under the alias ‘Realma’, based upon art songs I composed during the lockdown. The name is a punny wordplay on ‘realms’, since each of my songs is composed in a different music style/genre with the narrative situated in a new storyworld. The whole concept is being carried out in collaboration with different international and award-winning artists, with my songs being accompanied by animated and live session music videos and further re-interpreted as a comic booklets, mini video games and contemporary dance/physical theatre videos. Dedicating myself to the project, I’ve also created my production studio Daedalian Productions ltd.

Main Collaborators

Meet the main visual artists, who are helping me architect my audiovisual universe.

Mihajlo Dragaš

Mihajlo Dragas is an animator and 3D artist, currently based in Bor, Serbia. Born in 1991 in Chapljina, Bosni and Herzegovina, he graduated from Bachelor and Master’s degree in Animation at the Faculty of applied arts in Belgrade, Serbia. He is the author of four short animated films: “Two grimm ravens” (2019), ”ISKON – Anima Aeternam” (2015), ”Vis Dubium” (2014) and ”Sisyphus Carries Sisyphus” (2013), screened and awarded at domestic and international film festivals (GRAN PRIX of 63rd Belgrade Documentary and Short film festival for the animated film “ISKON Anima Aeternam”, Golden plaque of the city of Belgrade for the best Serbian animated film for the film “Vis Dubium” at the 63rd Belgrade Documentary and Short film festival, Film “Vis Dubium” awarded at the student film festival Student Cuts 2015 (Maribor, Slovenia) as the best animated film, Film “Vis Dubium” awarded at the international animation film festival Athens ANIMFEST 2015 (Athens, Greece) with the DISTINCTION award in the student category…). In addition to animated short films and animated music videos, Mihajlo also composes music his own music for films and is actively involved in the creation of digital 3D artwork.

Milica Staletović

https://www.studiostaletovic.com

Milica Staletović is a multimedia artist. She graduated BA in Graphic Design at the Metropolitan University in Belgrade in 2018, as well as two MA degrees in Design for New Media and Digital Arts in 2020 and 2021. She is experienced across a broad spectrum of disciplines, including graphic design, photography, traditional painting, video and music production, art installation and art direction. She speaks English fluently and has intermediate knowledge in German and Korean. Milica is greatly involved in the shaping of the audiovisual expression for Realmaverse, including the directing, editing and the production of Realma’s live session videos, as well as the creation of the artist’s short-form content and her cover art and artist photos.