IN HARMONY WITH THE PLACE AND TIME
Among the latest art colonies which have some chance to survive, thanks to the confirmed values of the artists who make them as well as the place where they gather and work, we should single out The art colony “CHILANDAR”. The colony started its activities not long ago, in 2003,
a year before the catastrophic fire. The artists have visited Chilandar and ‘Sveta Gora’- Mount Athos three times in
a row so far. The organizer of the colony, engineer Radosav Cvorovic, and its sponsor a store Ducan from Lazarevac, took the job very seriously. Completely aware of the duties set by the place of gathering as well as the high artistic goals and the relationship with the tradition and orthodox religion, they chose confirmed artists whose works have high aestethic principles.
Father Kirilo with the artists at the enter to the monastery
Even the dry statistics which say that eighteen artists
have taken part in the colony in the last three years
(four of them every year, the other four two times and
the rest of them once ) let us draw some conclusions.
The main value of The Colony are the works of the painters Aleksandar Lukovic-Lukijan (1924), Branko Miljus (1936), RatkoLalic (1944), Javor Rasajski (1946), Dusan Otasevic (1940), Jovan Rakihic(1944), Milan Stasevic (1946) and Milan Miletic (1950). Their work is followed by important works of Slavoljub Cvorovic(1934), Miroljub Djordjevic (1935), Vladimir Jankovic (1952), Rajko Popivoda (1953), Milutin Dragojlovic (1953),
Stanko Zecevic (1954), Milija Belic(1954),
Vasa Dolovacki (1960), Momcilo Macanovic (1966)
and Dragan Hajrovic (1970).
It is certain that at the head of The Colony stands Lukovic,who deserved this position by the importance of his previous work and his reputation. Conscious that he,
as a person and artist, was formed on the spiritual
premise of Sartr’s existentialism and Jonesko’s theatre
of absurd, whose satiric nature very often completely contradicts the icon painting, he wisely makes his composition in Chilandar on two plans. The front plan is made in the spirit of realism, but without his usual irony and sarcasm, while the background plan is represented
by drawings which give the work necessary transcendentalism and spirituality.
Like Lukovic, Miljus also finds successful solutions,
without making any significant compromises to the life in the monastery and at the same time taking care not to disturb it, he stays faithful to his well-formed art poetics. Actually, he stays faithful to those values that,no matter whether it is a graphic,painting or a mosaic, put him in the centre of the history of Serbian art in the second part of the 20th century and the first years of the 3 rd millennium.
In the vineyard
The works of the other two artists, Lalic and Rasajski, although aesthetically different, have something in common. They are both trying and succeeding, efficiently and remarkably to express the quality of individual through general and collective. For Lalic,the basis is unmistakable materialization of the flora and for Rasajski it is the fauna, in the first place birds. Their willingness and skill, make un intrusive dedication to the hospitality of the Serbian
holy place , monastery Chilandar, at the same time keeping the values by which their previous work can be identified.
Although the formal differences in artistic approach of
the four artists who have taken part in The Colony two times, Otasevic, Rakihic, Stasevic and Miletic, may seem great and insurmountable , they are not. All four artists approach their work completely conscious that the world exists as they see and represent it, more exactly,
the artistic true is more important than the truth of nature. Because of that the work of Otasevic, rarely paintings, more often objects, installations and sometimes some kind of stenography, are his active and contemporary dialogue with the history of art and cultural heritage . His visit to Chilandar was another artistic inspiration and a step
forward in his successful career.
The visit of two other art pedagogues, Rakihic and Stasevic, to Chilandar, was another inspiration for their work. Not occupied by pictorial values of pure artistic materia,willing to control their emotional nature, both of them demonstrate the process through which it is possible to reach artistic goals, starting from nature. It is important to say that the young painter Hajrovic follows their steps,but since he formed his style on the spirit of postmodern ideas, he makes an expected and
necessary step forward.
Contrary to them, Miletic insists on the realistic relationship to the nature and materia. Although,
the ways he expresses himself in his later art process
are becoming less realistic. The space and materia, in spite of hyperrealistic illusion, seem more metaphysical than real in his works. Because of that he is much closer to the spirit of icon and the character of an icon-painter than to painting and character of a painter.
The painting of Dolovacki, Dragojlovic and Macanovic
is following the aesthetic ideas of Miletic. For all of them reality with its realistic and sometimes hyperrealistic process that they use is not the final goal but only the means through which they express transcendental relationship with the nature. The truth of their painting,through the methods of icon-painting, outgrows the truth of the nature and motive.
Very similar to them ,in the approach, understanding and the realization of their own aesthetic ideas, are an art pedagogue, a graphic artist and a painter, Cvorovic, then Djordjevic, Jankovic and to some degree, Belic. Their approach to painting lies on the irreproachable knowledge of the basic principles of art, elastic structure of drawing, harmonious colours, convincing materialization, harmonious composition and emotional satisfaction, which has no
equal in contemporary Serbian art.
A bit aside from the other members of the Colony,
because of the differences in style and technique, are Zecevic and Popivoda. The only sculptor, Popivoda, fit
into the majority of painters. He chose to work in shallow relief whose structure (starting with motives which look
like geometric ornaments on the church wall decorations and the harmony in light and dark surfaces) is close to
the spirit of orthodox religion- to achieve maximum of expression through minimum of resources.
The fact that Zecevic from the very beginning of his career chose the painting in which surreal and real, dream and awareness, imagination and reality are interwoven in a sensitive and emotional way, puts him in the place which
is the furthest from the orthodox spirit. On the other hand, the high values of his sensitive drawings, his mastery in painting represent the values which provide him the place in the history of contemporary Serbian art.
If the organizers of
The art colony Chilandar tried to
gather and motivate the artists who will leave the works that will stand the test of time and become the heritage
for the future, they succeeded in it.
