JURICA KEZIĆ: PICTORIAL GROUND Museum Fine Arts

The monographic exhibition Pictorial Ground has been organised to mark the ninetieth anniversary of Jurica Kezić’s birth and the seventieth anniversary of his first solo exhibition, held in Split in 1956. More than thirty years after his last solo exhibition, this commemorative context serves as the occasion both for a reassessment of the artist’s painterly oeuvre, and for its exposure to contemporary perspectives.

Kezić’s painting is rooted in the experience of landscape, earth and space. Over the decades, the recognisable landscape gradually receded from the picture, though the experience underlying it did not disappear. It remained embedded in the layer, the furrow, the grid, the boundary and the trace, in the condensation and dissolution of the painterly matter. The earth thus shifted from being a motif to functioning as structure and memory, while the pictorial surface became a space in which distinct temporalities intersect. The trace of nature meets the trace of human intervention, order meets disruption, permanence meets change, light meets dark. And it is precisely in these tensions that the potential for a contemporary reading of Kezić’s painting emerges. His paintings resonate strongly today with the experience of a world defined by environmental fragility, by unstable spatial and social relations, and by the increasingly evident consequences of man’s attempt to subject space to his own order. Matter in his paintings is never fully stilled. It is constantly accumulating, cracking, eroding and reassembling. Structure is established only provisionally, as a fragile balance perpetually exposed to further transformation. And yet, the possibility of form repeatedly re-emerges from this condensation, from cracks and disruptions. In this constant push and pull of forming and unforming, Kezić’s paintings transcend the time in which they were made and enter our own.

This openness to time also characterised the breadth of Kezić’s artistic practice. His contribution to the arts extends beyond the field of painting, which this exhibition puts back in the spotlight. He expanded the experience of painting into the applied arts, interior design and architectural space, bringing visual thinking into dialogue with the spaces of everyday life. He left an equally important mark through his teaching and his work in higher art education, serving as a professor and dean of the Arts Academy in Split. As a painter, designer and educator, Jurica Kezić is one of those artists whose contribution to the cultural sphere is measured not only by the works they left behind, but also by the spaces of knowledge, experience and artistic sensitivity they opened up to others.

Dalibor Prančević

Jurica Kezić was born on 17 January 1936 in Split, where he spent his childhood and early youth in the Meje district. After completing his primary education, he enrolled at the School of Applied Art in Split, graduating in 1956, and went on to continue his studies at the Academy of Fine Arts in Bologna. That same year, together with fellow students and with the support of the writer Nikola Disopra, he took part in organising the Youth Exhibition in Split, an event recognised as one of the early manifestations of a new artistic sensibility making its way into the Split scene. Towards the end of the year, he also held his first solo exhibition, opened with an introductory address by Kruno Prijatelj. Even at this early stage, his artistic trajectory became connected with the Italian cultural sphere, particularly with Ferrara, where, in early 1957, he staged his second solo exhibition at the “Cosmè” gallery. In the same year, he exhibited in the restored Vestibule of Diocletian’s Palace in Split, thereby effecting a departure of sorts from conventional gallery practice and bringing his work into a more immediate dialogue with the city’s historic space. The year 1957 also marked a significant turning point in his personal life, when he started a family with Ankica Meštrović and relocated to Solin, where he would remain for the rest of his life. The following year, their twins, Marina and Mario, were born. It was also the year in which he embarked on his long teaching career, initially working as an art teacher at a primary school in Kaštel Sućurac. He completed his fine art studies at the Pedagogical Academy in Split in 1972, and in 1975 graduated in Fine Art and Art Education from the Split department of the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences in Zadar.

From the early 1960s, he was also actively involved in the applied arts and in the design of architectural environments. Notable projects from this period include the decorations at the Hotel Marjan and a frieze at Split Airport, both completed in 1963. From 1968 onwards, he collaborated with Dalma and Koteks, contributing, among other projects, to the interior design of Dalma department stores. During the 1970s, he participated in group exhibitions, including the May Day Exhibitions and the Split Salon. Towards the end of the decade, in 1979, he was elected to the Presidency of HDLU Split, where he was involved in restructuring the association and reviving its exhibition programme. He returned to solo exhibiting with greater intensity in 1981, at the Museum of Modern Art in Dubrovnik, with curator Antun Karaman, and at the Art Salon in Split, with curator Petar Selem. In 1983, he became president of HDLU Split, devoting particular effort to strengthening exhibition exchange within the Croatian artistic sphere. Two years later, he spent time at the International Art Centre in Paris, after which he held a solo exhibition at the Karas Gallery Salon in Zagreb. Over the course of his long artistic career, he exhibited widely, both at solo and group exhibitions, in Croatia and abroad. Equally significant was his contribution to higher arts education. From 1989 onwards, he worked as an assistant professor at the Split department of the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences in Zadar, becoming an associate professor in 1993 and a full professor in 1996. He participated in founding the Arts Academy of the University of Split, where, from 2000, he served as a full professor and as its first dean. Following his retirement in 2006, he was awarded the honorary title of professor emeritus.

Kezić’s artistic and professional career took shape at the intersection of painting, applied art and art education. His contribution to the artistic culture of Split and Croatia is evident in his works, the spaces he designed, and his long-standing commitment to arts education and the development of its institutions. Jurica Kezić died on 16 May 2021.

Solo exhibitions

1956. Split, ULUH Salon

1957. Ferrara, “Cosmè” Gallery

Split, Vestibul

1958. Split, House of Culture (Bishop’s Palace)

1961. Split, ULUH Salon

1963. Osijek, Exhibition Hall

1981. Dubrovnik, Museum of Modern Art

Split, Art Salon (Krešimirova 3)

1982. Zadar, City Loggia (National Museum Gallery)

1984. Split, “Kripta” Gallery (with Mile Skračić and Kuzma Kovačić)

1985. Zagreb, “Karas” Gallery Salon - HDLUZ