Curators: Siniša Ninčević and Iris Slade
LUDEO ERGO SUM
„… The most recent series of the black-and-white paintings depicting the distinctive motives, cliffs, ships, a view of sea-side towns sitting at the foot of the Sainte Victoiresque geological formations finely shaded with a sense of well-proportioned black and grey masses and surfaces of the city walls and houses, speaks of the Mediterranean as the artist's starting point and module. The new expressiveness occupies the big-sized paintings making the size a formal component part of the new sensibility. The Mediterranean Component in Lipovac's art recalls Cézanne's basic principles thorugh neoclassicism of the twenties (Miše, Plančić, Job, Tartaglia). However, this rational Apollonian picture of the world ordered by canon laws of harmony between the man and nature as the lost original world, the land of hapiness… the Mediterranean world as an image of Arcadian bliss (I. Reberski) is not well-balanced any more. Lipovac's landscapes now dark and barren are almost ominous, and the greyness in place of the sunlit whiteness threateningly covers the city walls. Extinguishing his palette of pure bright colours the artist seems to warn us, and the existential uneasiness, which permeates this cycle, makes us recalue our attitude because we seem to have forgotten the right to tolerance is not exclusively our privilege…“
Siniša Ninčević, from the exhibition catalogue
THE SEA AS DESTINY
„… Everybody is represented with equal sympathy in Lipovac's Panopticum: proud captains, sailors embracing their darlings in a love play, carefree and seductive coquettes, harmless peeping Toms… They are all presented tonight playing their life parts assigned to them by the sea. Most of them occupied Lipovac's paintings or stepped out into the space long ago. They had no faces in the beginning, but were easily recognized for their clothes, pose or the context… There went a ship together with a captain, a sailor wore a sailor's striped shirt, a fisherman had his harpoon… By its form the represented figure almost became one with its attribute. In the last decade the artist's idea has been to individualize his characters. Adding some physiognomical feature he gives us more detail description, which does not necessarily mean that his sculptures have undergone the process of the immetical consistency resulting in boring precision. Despite their physiognomical, mimetical and gesticular diversity, they retain their anonimity as well as the attributes to identify them, Their stylized, puppet-like faces and bodies with prominent eyes, mouths and chins never seem to be caricatured or grotesque due to the author's creative wittiness…“
Iris Slade, from the exhibition catalogue
Vasko Lipovac (June 14, 1931 – July 4, 2006) was a Croatian painter, sculptor, printmaker, designer, illustrator andscenographer and one of the most prominent artists of the region. He is best known for his minimalist figuration and use of intense, unmodulated and often dissonant palette. With the exception of his juvenile period of geometric abstraction, he remained loyal to figuration throughout his whole career. Exceptionally prolific, he worked in various techniques and was equally skilful in using high-polished metal, polychromous wood, enamel, terracotta or polyester to create his sculptures, reliefs and mobiles.
