Gabriel Jurkić
Landscape, s. a.
oil on cardboard
35 x 25 cm
MG-915

In the landscapes of his native region, Gabriel Jurkić captures the spiritual beauty that emanates in countless possible manifestations. The nature of western Bosnia, the hills and plateaus of Livno and Kupres, are his true inspirations and spaces of artistic freedoms. From his earliest youthful attempts to his later years spent in the seclusion of the Franciscan monastery in Gorica, it was precisely in the pristine sub-Dinaric expanses that Jurkić discovered “a new motif at every turn and instance.” In the Landscape from the 1930s, he captures the light in the clouds and the wind in the branches with unrestrained strokes, natural hues, and harmonised gamut, conveying an impression of magnificent consonance with nature. Paintings of his native land as visions of earthly and heavenly harmony position Gabriel Jurkić among our greatest landscape artists of the 20th century.
After his artistic education in Zagreb under Bela Čikoš-Sesija and Menci Clement Crnčić, followed by studies at the Academy of Fine Arts under Alois Delug and specialisation under Kazimierz Pochwalski in Vienna, Gabriel Jurkić (Livno, Bosnia and Herzegovina, 1886 – 1974) executed his first significant works in the spirit of Symbolism and Art Nouveau (Highland in Bloom, 1914, from the collection of the National Gallery of Bosnia and Herzegovina in Sarajevo; Passage to Eternity, 1918, from the NMMA collection). During the 1920s, he merged impressionist experiences with the decorative elements of Art Nouveau. Over more than six decades of intensive artistic work, he mostly painted landscapes, portraits, and religious themes. In Jurkić’s later works, a spiritual realism prevailed, and he also engaged in graphic arts, book design, illustration, and restoration.

Lada Bošnjak Velagić, museum consultant of the National Museum of Modern Art © National Museum of Modern Art, Zagreb
Translated by: Robertina Tomić
Photo: Goran Vranić © National Museum of Modern Art, Zagreb

Lada Bošnjak Velagić, muzejska savjetnica Nacionalnog muzeja moderne umjetnosti © Nacionalni muzej moderne umjetnosti, Zagreb
Foto: Goran Vranić © Nacionalni muzej moderne umjetnosti, Zagreb