Tag: Self-portrait

Miroslav Kraljević, Self-portrait, 1912

Miroslav Kraljević
Self-portrait, 1912
oil on canvas, 64 x 45 cm
MG-774

Miroslav Kraljević (1885–1913) hails from a prominent Slavonian family. He was educated in Zagreb in the period from 1898 to 1902, and then spent two years in Gospić attending grammar school. In the autumn of 1904, he started studying law in Vienna and was also taking Georg Fischhof’s painting classes. After having abandoned law school, he started attending graphic artist Moritz Heymann’s private school in Munich in 1906/07. In May 1907, he was admitted to the Munich Academy where he studied under Hugo von Habermann and socialised with Josip Račić and Vladimir Becić (the Munich Circle). After he graduated, Kraljević returned to Požega in 1910 and painted intensively until September 1911, when he moved to Paris and enrolled at the Académie de la Grande Chaumière, which he soon abandoned. He first worked in Meštrović’s studio and then his own in Montparnasse. He published caricatures in the satirical magazine Panurge. In 1912, he had his first and only solo exhibition in the Ulrich Salon in Zagreb. He died of tuberculosis in 1913.

Kraljević’s Self-portrait from 1912, painted one year before his death, completes a series of the artist’s self-portraits, which began with the renowned Self-portrait with a Dog, painted in 1910. Unlike the realistic depiction and the Munich manner of tonal painting in the self-portrait from 1910, where the artist’s youth and health are emphasised by the vitality of the dog in the centre lower part of the painting, in the Self-portrait from 1912, in turn, the physicality of the artist’s tuberculosis-ridden figure has completely disappeared in the expressionist treatment of the energetic, long brush stroke. Facial features are devoid of meticulous treatment and only indicated with a rough pennelatta thus enhancing the expressive effect of the whole. The concrete ambience of the room from the earlier self-portrait in a seated position and painted almost in full height, is replaced with a depiction of a bust and a focus on the face emerging from the anonymous, dark olive-green background suggesting the artist’s body weakened by disease and imminent death.

Tekst: Ivana Rončević Elezović, museum advisor of the National Museum of Modern Art © National Museum of Modern Art, Zagreb 2022
Translated by: Robertina Tomić
Photo: Goran Vranić © National Museum of Modern Art, Zagreb 2022

Oscar Artur Alexander, Self-portrait, 1896

Oscar Artur Alexander
Self-portrait, 1896
oil on canvas, 96.5 x 75 cm
O. Aleksander 1896
MG-370

The Self-portrait from 1896, is certainly one of the best paintings of the lesser-known painter-portraitist Alexander. Embittered by the behaviour of his contemporaries towards him and having been left alone in Samobor, where he retreated, he prohibited the exhibition of his works in Croatian museums. It seems that erasing everything that was created in the past and the memory of those who have created something before, is a constant in Croatian culture, with the aim of usurping the present moment and themselves because it all begins anew with those who are currently shaping that culture. The life and painting of Oscar Artur Alexander is more than a paradigmatic example of such an attitude towards one’s predecessors. Hailing from a wealthy merchant family that laid the foundations of Croatian 19th and 20th century industry (little of which is known today or is overlooked), he was able to study in Europe’s most prestigious cities – he spent time in Paris on two occasions, and briefly studied at the Academy in Vienna. During his first stay in Paris, he attended the Academie Juliàn, and later worked in the studios of Eugene Carrière and James McNeil Whistler. The second time Alexander stayed in Paris (1898 - 1902) is even more important for the formation of his painterly expression. Around 1900, Paris is a dynamic space of cultural creation and the site of various art events. Alexander will socialize with Matoš, among others, who also spent time in Paris, and they will attend exhibitions together and discuss art. As an exceptional portraitist, he will be influenced by Renoir’s version of Impressionism, and between Whistler’s and Carrière’s Symbolism, he will opt for the latter. In Paris, he was also introduced to the work of Ferdinand Hodler (Snježana Pintarić, 1998). Around 1905, Alexander moved to Vienna again where he became a full member of the Hagebund.

In the Self-portrait from 1896, Alexander finds himself half-way between academic principles and the intuitive manner of modern painting. Illuminating his palette when painting the background, he also uses the free application of paint with a visible brushstroke, in line with Bukovac’s portraits. He portrayed himself as a self-confident young man with a penetrating gaze. The decision to immortalize himself in a dark suit and tie adds to the seriousness of this self-portrait! What particularly stands out in this three quarter view portrait are the painter’s basic “tools” – the eyes and the right hand, which we could include in the imaginary gallery of masterpieces of painted hands. Alexander’s palette will later be further illuminated, sometimes to the point of fluidity, especially in his symbolist works, and he will make a few excursions towards the expressionism of colour.

Text: Dajana Vlaisavljević, 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

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