The exhibition Rudolf Gerhart Bunk: Works from the Museum of Fine Arts’ Collection presents the works of a German artist who was shaped in the spirit and under the influence of Expressionism, during a time when German art made a significant contribution to 20th century avant-garde art. Without claiming to provide a comprehensive overview, the exhibition showcases a small sample of the artist’s works, presenting his creative output from 1938 to 1958, a period of twenty years during which he achieved his artistic pinnacles while living and working in Split.
Rudolf Gerhart Bunk emerged on the Croatian art scene in the late 1930s and became professionally active in the 1940s, during a turbulent period when a multitude of different styles with characteristics of both traditionalism and avant-garde mixed, alternated, and coexisted in Croatian painting. These styles ranged from Secession, Cézanneism, and Neoclassicism to Cubism and Post-Cubism, Constructivism, and Expressionist colourism, as well as from figuration to abstract-expressionist and abstract-geometric tendencies. Advocating shared aesthetic principles and artistic attitudes, some of the most prominent artists of the time came together publicly as groups – such as the Group of Three (Ljubo Babić, Vladimir Becić, and Jerolim Miše), the Group of Four (artists who were educated at the Prague Academy: Milivoj Uzelac, Marijan Trepše, Vilko Gecan, and Vladimir Varlaj), and the “Earth” Group (Krsto Hegedušić, Leo Junek, Oton Postružnik, Ivan Tabaković). Bunk was adept at navigating the constellation of such visually tumultuous decades in Croatia, always remaining sufficiently tenacious in his efforts to preserve his artistic sensibility.
