Baudelaire wrote the most beautiful essays on Delcaora. If I had at least a little of Baudelaire's imagination and poetic power, I would write the most beautiful essays about Dragan Pečurica's painting.
Some will say: similar to Voj Stanić! Which can be done, but only at first glance, at first. But it's not, even though it's a compliment. Pechurica is a painter from Škver, a painter from Škver, like Stanić. They are separated by about a hundred meters. But everyone has their own world, their own universe. His slanted, own, angle of view. Your own Mediterranean and your own world. We are all different, even when we seem to be similar. There are no two identical voices, just as there are no two identical people, no two painters. Even the most perfect copies are originals. Borges is a possible proof. We all carry the self, the most authentic one, shades of colors, perception of the world. Every stroke is different, every line. We are all different, even when it seems that we are completely similar.
Every painter has his own window and his own eye. Different bouquets, but their own shades, their own colors. Your own land and your own sea. The inner one. There is no identical picture, just as there is no identical song. Every poet has his own poem. And the painter he loves.
Baudelaire had Delacroix. As Delacroix had Baudelaire. Lucky date or higher case. One cannot say everything. There is always someone to replace what we leave out. This is the understanding between artists that holds art.
My wish is not to write art criticism, that can be done by those who deal with it, but to draw attention to one painter and his painting. To the fact that one authentic and different painter exists in Herceg Novi, in Montenegro, in the Mediterranean.
It is an important fact, and it appears in various forms, nuances and messages, characters, Pečurica was born in the house where Saint Leopold Mandić was also born. Hence, something sacred in this painting. In motives and spirit, the halo that spreads from these pictures. And beyond them. The spirit cannot be framed. What Pečuirc's painting lasts beyond the picture and the frame.
Art is a sacred state. A religion that must be believed! I believe in this painting and the one who creates it. I feel a duty to draw the attention of gallerists. And not only to them, but also to all those who love painting, contemporaries, cultural workers. To those who, in this time of indifference, in which values are forgotten or not seen, how much do they take care of spiritual creativity.
So, let me draw your attention or your attention!
Well, there is a painter in Herceg Novi! Which in the best way continues the tradition of those for whom your city is known: Stanić, as I said, then the inevitable: Prijić, Pravilović, Bulajić, Džumhur...
The mushroom follows that pattern, but with its own signs, which are recognizable.
A painter who articulates his artistic expression through an imaginary and surreal world, thematically related to the climate in which he lives, but also everything that as a theme can be an association with the world of virtual reality, bringing a new tone of mysticism and stories through images that encourage reflection, although at first glance, it would seem that the simplicity of the figuration and uncrowdedness of the canvas leaves room for the ski itself to be further refined.
The narration in the pictures encourages thinking about the connection between the painting and the message that the author wants to convey to the viewer, without falling into the trap of trivializing the idea or falling into likability, which in itself leads to too much simplicity.
There are few painters from this region who have chosen this style of painting because it in itself requires not only drawing skills, but also conceptual and coloristic knowledge of the painting technique itself. Pechurica brings a distinctive handwriting, although each painting has no defining points of contact in terms of color and theme.
- When I stand in front of an unfinished canvas, I don't know in which direction the painting will lead me. That is the charm of painting. If it didn't exist, the painter would have no motivation to work. If he knew in advance what would happen at the end, the painting would have no invested emotion, it would turn into kitsch - says the painter.
At the bottom of the familiar to find the new - Baudelaire would say.
Pechurica is a painter of the sea. He gets his first knowledge of the world and colors on the coast. This closeness of the sea and the artist leaves a bright stamp of color that the painter will use in his work through surreal themes that he encounters through imagination or through the freedom of subject matter and simplicity.
Dragan Pečurica's paintings are not crammed with elements just to fill the form, and thus the balance of the painting itself, but harmony is established through the simplicity of the form, which leaves a strong impression on the idea of the work itself, freed from mere likability.
- You need to have courage and be outside the flow, be authentic. The reality that imposes that everything that is not just painting is more important than creating a form about the painter himself as an unusual person or rhetorically overemphasizing talking about the painting itself, which leads to the meaningless of the painting itself. Writing a lot about the painting itself negates its essence and the painting loses its significance, according to this painter.
- Every painter must be a good draftsman, and the idea itself comes as a special category of the moment and in the power of perception before the very act of creation, which every painter must show with his work, and then in his evolution discard the unnecessary and arrive at the simplicity of the form. That's why it takes time, patience, dedicated work. Today, there are few artists who have these postulates as their path.
- Pictures are like people, it is not enough to be beautiful - you also need to have charisma, and that is created when a person is confident in himself and what he does - says Pechurica.
Although he had several notable group and solo exhibitions, this text is not created with the occasion, but rather out of the desire to draw attention to a painting that is important for Montenegro and its Mediterranean spirit.
"Delacroix told me one day: Art is a thing so ideal and instantaneous that the tools are never clean enough, nor the powers quick enough. Likewise with literature; I am not, therefore, a supporter of scribbling; it clouds the mirror of thought... Even if the result is excellent, it means abusing your time and gift," writes Baudelaire about the great painter. And poets have always found refuge in painters. The same could be said for their fellow painters and the understanding that poets showed for them.
I wrote this text based on those motives. To be written down. That at one time I understood a painter who was not given the due attention and respect that he undoubtedly deserves.
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