The literary program of the City Theater, for the very end and the "check-out peak" of this segment of the festival, arranged a real event - Dimitrije Popović, one of the most famous and respected artists in the region, was a guest at Poets' Square.
Popović came to the audience in Budva with the book "Luča Njegoševe noci", in which, exploring the poetics of the great romantic, he also questions his own aesthetics.
After he finished the cycle of ninety paintings inspired by the Montenegrin bishop and poet, and then shaped it into a monograph with a precious preface that reveals not only artistic but also family contacts with his great predecessor, his literary, narrative telling came with the story "Luča Njegoševa noci" ", which originates from a unique system of artistic coding.
A native of Cetinje who completed his studies at the Academy of Fine Arts in Zagreb, in an inspired conversation led by Božena Jelušić, he prepared an evening to remember on the packed Poets' Square.
"Budva has a special place in my life, private, intimate, it is a city that revealed another dimension of reality to me when I saw the sea for the first time"
"When a small country like Montenegro has such an artist as Dimitrije Popović, then it can get its own brand and be like big countries. Montenegro is lucky to have such people," she said at the beginning of the conversation, emphasizing that the evening of Dimitrije Popović in Budva dedicated to the jubilee of Njegoš.
The book "Luča Njegoševe noci" (National Community of Montenegrins in Croatia and "Skaner Studio doo") is one of a series of books that Popović has published more often in the last decade, and deals with literary work that goes hand in hand with his artistic creation.
One can go a step further and say that it is, in fact, a kind of syncretism - if we remember the great exhibition of posters for theater performances and operas, it is clear that Dimitrije Popović's overall interest goes in all the directions in which the fine arts go. "Luča Njegoševe noci" basically has a simple story - the artist, a native of Cetinje, whose initials are BS, returns after several decades of living abroad with the intention of making a theater play and, something that has the character of a magnificent performance in honor of Njegoš's bicentennial. ...
In the three parts of this book, Popović will in fact take us through a vision of the work of art, which tries to penetrate into the very essence of both the great poet's personality and his poetic thought in that visualization, that description of the theatrical performance...
"What constitutes a problem for every creator, and all that connects all artists regardless of the subject they deal with, is artistic expression. And since the word was first, as it is written in the Gospel, or there were images first, as some claim artists, in my case it permeates in a certain way".
"The picture provokes the word just as much as the word provokes it to be articulated into a picture. By writing, that is, by painting certain themes and cycles that were provocative and exciting for me, from Dante, Kafka, now Njegoš, and in the next project by the Marquis de Sade, I show exactly that problem, regardless of my means of expression," Popović said.
Njegoš himself, as he pointed out, is fascinating because of his extraordinary interest, both in life and in literature:
"As I have dealt intensively with such a personality, more in a poetic way than in a scientific way, what I know about Njegoš, his life and his work gives me the right to say that it seems to me that we are all deprived of one, perhaps, his omission - that , for example, Njegoš wrote his confessions as Saint Augustine, I'm sure it would be extraordinary, not only a testimony about him and his tragic personality, but it would shed light on the complexity of his work".
"If you take into account the fact that, as I have often pointed out, he was born a poet, and that due to circumstances he became a bishop, and it is a great obligation to lead state affairs, then we can see how difficult it actually was for him. In the environment and circumstances who were not in favor of him, to lead the life of both a poet and a statesman, and also to have a serious illness, means that we can rightly look at Njegoš as a phenomenon..."
In a conversation with Dimitrije Popović at Poets' Square, Božena Jelušić also referred to the fact that he is one of the seventeen artists and philosophers to whom Pope John Paul II sent a letter in which he spoke about art in our time, about what an artist can do today and what is, when asked whether reality is more fascinating than imagination for him, the question of popular phenomena that can be found in his works, such as Merlin Monroe, as well as what constitutes his personal memories:
"Budva has a special place in my life, private, intimate, it is the city that revealed another dimension of reality to me when I saw the sea for the first time. And what fascinated me the most, when I saw that line from above, from the Budva pyramid , a line that connects, that is, separates, the width of the sea and the infinity of the sky".
"That city is important to me because my mother is a native of Budva, my uncle is Bobo Mitrović, although from the looks of things you would say that I am his uncle! He was an important person for my transition and my growing up, because we acquired and gave away interesting books, recognizing my inclinations for painting and literature".
"Among those, important Budva people to me are Mladen Suđić, who took me to the cinema, Siniša Jelušić, with whom I often talked. It may seem strange to some that in those years we talked about Sartre, about Saint John Perce, the French poet who sang probably the most significant poem in praise of the sea..."
"I wanted to say one more thing - from that time I remember a beautiful girl with long blond hair who went swimming with a towel over her shoulder and always with a book in her hand. That girl, today Mrs. Božena Jelušić, is having this conversation with me tonight, and I'm very happy about that..."
The city as a labyrinth phenomenon
"Budva showed me the city as a labyrinth phenomenon, where in a certain way as a child I felt some fear of not getting lost, and that's why I made a destination of my own where I could go, conquer a new part of the city and return home".
"The view of the sky was also outlined by that labyrinth, it showed the sky, exactly as the streets determined it. I believe that the environment in which a person grows up significantly affects the formation of his personality, and the sensibility with which he feels life and the world around him".
"I wrote about it, and also talked with Doctor Dubravka Mitrović, to what extent one climate can significantly influence the character of what a person does and creates. Budva, through Njegoš, returns to that circle again tonight, closes it and opens it again new topics, pointed out Dimitrije Popović".
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