Voj Stanić I remember from the time when I was four years old and he was less than fifty. More than fifty have passed since then... Spectacular team from Herceg Novi - lordly Luka Tomanović, noisy Aco Prijic and smiling Vojo Stanić - she often came to Titograd in those years, sometimes to the sessions of the Association of Fine Artists, sometimes to the exhibitions of her colleagues. And they would always spend at least part of their time in Titograd with my parents. I remember those arrivals as sudden evening festivals of good humor and laughter. Luka and Vojo drank brandy or wine, and Aco cognac. My mother later told me that I would crawl under the table and dip my finger into Ace's glass of cognac, then into my mouth. So I could say, regardless of my age at the time, that I tasted the first alcohol in my life with Aca, Luka and Voj.
I grew up with the paintings of Voj Stanić. It is just a cosmic privilege, for which, admittedly, I did not deserve it, but I am grateful.
The pictures on the wall are from childhood - a kind of magic. It's as if you have a bunch of windows in your room, all looking out into separate courtyards, into different worlds.
And those windows that witnessed the unusual world of Voj Stanić were the most interesting. With each subsequent viewing, a new detail would emerge, the picture was semantically inexhaustible, so each look at it was longer.
Vojo turns one hundred years old today. It's one of those things that always sounds amazing. That's why this issue of Art is completely dedicated to the master, both as a congratulatory message and a little chrestomathy about the artist who marked our epoch.
Montenegrin culture rarely knows how to show respect to true greats. And he often tries to make great people out of caricatures. But there is no alchemy that can do that.
Voj's exhibition at the SAN Gallery in Knez Mihailova in 1988 was an event that buzzed all over Belgrade.
Around that time I met a nice man, he was a retired art teacher and the father of my good friend. Sir Tasic he mentioned to me that he finished sculpting right after the Second World War, and then he started talking about his class, about his colleagues from the student studio - Matija Vuković, Voj Stanić and Dear Đurović... When he realized that I knew Voj (and I also remembered Drago), his stories became even more colorful. I remember his description of how the always well-groomed Drago Đurović left the studio before everyone else, he set the figure, but he didn't overly deal with the face, so he threw from the door: "Taso, take a look at this face, it's your honor." (And then they saw him at the exit raising his legs and cleaning his patent shoes with their hanging coats.) Tasa tells me that he didn't know what "careful" meant, but Vojo explained it to him. His memories of Voj were different - full of pure admiration, human and artistic. He told me that Vojo used to read aloud in the studio Vinaverov translation Rabelais Gargantua and Pantagruel... It was a spectacle, he says. “We would all eventually stop working and turn into his audience. I immediately found the book, but it wasn't even close to when you listen to Voj reading and acting..." Wasn't that Rabelais stamp (along with the signature of Vinaver's translation genius) visible on Voj's work from the beginning?
Art has powers that we suspect and those that we do not know. Both have an effect on us.
I was always fascinated by Voj's childish eyes. His eyes, like the miraculous Wilde's DG, not old. That kind of liveliness can produce a miracle. I believe that such purity of vision is the reason for his exceptional art as well as his longevity...
Because if your view does not grow old, if "reasonableness does not devastate you", if you do not silence your wonders but give them entire gardens, if you never stop playing...
Can old age come to such a person and if it does - can he do anything.
A mythical creature, like a unicorn. A centenarian with the eyes of a child.
Happy century, maestro!
Bonus video:
