Vladimir Becić
Klasija, 1911
oil on canvas, 55.5 x 68 cm
MG-2270

Vladimir Becić (1886–1954) attended the private painting school of Menci Clement Crnčić and Bela Čikoš Sesija in Zagreb. Like Miroslav Kraljević, he abandoned his law studies and moved to Munich in 1905 to focus on painting. There, he joined Hugo von Habermann’s painting class, where he studied alongside Račić, Kraljević, and Herman between 1905 and 1910, becoming part of the Munich Circle. In 1909, he relocated to Paris and enrolled at the Académie de la Grande Chaumière. Over the course of his long life, he lived in various places, including Zagreb, Osijek, Belgrade, Bitola, and Blažuj near Sarajevo, where he built his studio. During World War I, he served as a correspondent and war artist for L’Illustration magazine on the Salonika front. Becić’s artistic style spanned a range of influences, from Munich realism, Expressionism, and Cézannism to magical realism and colouristic realism.
In this work, Becić uses expressive, bold, and visible brushstrokes to depict a forest scene with green treetops, grass, black trunks, and shadows. Sunlight filters through the canopy in the right triangle of the composition (above the diagonal from the top left to the bottom right corner), serving as the central focal point of the painting. The brushwork is intentionally energetic, thick, and highly visible, emphasising the Expressionist nature of the depiction.

Text: Ivana Rončević Elezović Phd., museum advisor of the National Museum of Modern Art © National Museum of Modern Art, Zagreb
Zagreb
Translated by: Robertina Tomić
Photo: Goran Vranić © National Museum of Modern Art, Zagreb