CRITICS   

Stanko Špoljarić  /  Leo Slijepčević  /  Mladen Mitar

Jean Starobinski once said that Proust had been neither first nor last one who had noticed the “disharmony” between the things that can be seen and the possibility of expressing it in words. Corot’s sentence expresses in a impressive and simple way the feeling of inability of a writer and the painter: »When I am in the nature, I am angry at my canvas.« Vlasta Pastuović Aleksić has no reason to say so, because she isn’t stressed by mimesis. The nature serves to her just as a sample, where from she builds her personal visual artistic interpretation. Delighted with sensual pleasures of the world appearance, she transforms the experience of the nature trough the strong immediate blurred strokes into the rich coloristic arabesque. On her paintings landscapes are artistically impressed. In the morphology of visual arts dominates a harmony of Na monodimensional concept. Her visual artistic intuition creates at the moment when the visions get captured in the net of the spirit. In one breath she creates compositions, so that her paintings radiate with the freshness of artistic performance. Spring is the most inspiring season. Universal blossom and expansion of the shapes are a constant occupation of her attention. Sketching and stylization fit properly into the casualness of the artistic manifest by itself. Compositional horizontal becomes more often, but it hasn’t reached its limits yet. Coloristic observation has been settled to a green, blue yellow and violet color with moderate and sufficient dose of red. The strokes point on a recognizable strong expressive gesture that distinguishes many ways of spreading the paint, from glazed to saturated thick layers. Almost in all compositions, observation of the landscapes comes from the elevated point and afterwards keeps slowly descending, the pictures are overlapping starting from the most distant one; from the green shades of the fields to the remains of the blue sky-lines. Comparing the painted composition with experienced vision, we could say that those are the landscapes of the painter’s soul in the first place, that were made as one new piece of nature with independent existence. In this exhibition on the theme of landscapes still life plays also one small role. It is interesting to notice some compositions, where the painter enters in micro- parts of the tree crowns, leaving the thematic context behind. This action highlights the artistical matter, moving off the description of the details, avoiding layouts. In this way the rhythm, graphic, and coloratura get the same treatment. Vlasta’s hedonistic comprehension of nature goes trough the painter condensation. The main assignment to Vlasta is to know how to greet the beauty. It is surprising how strongly climate was absorbed into her painting of landscapes and how it had defined her painter’s temper. It takes a great courage to paint a landscape today, considering the promotion of this theme trough the history of arts. Vlasta Pastuović isn’t strained by modern ways of expression, believing that she can find sparkles of creativity in the traditional ways of expression. True honest painting of the landscapes justifies the achievements of her style.

»No to be blindfolded in front of the beauty of the world means at the same time a rebellion against evil and the beginning of learning, first degree of non equanimity towards the pain of one’s neighbour.« (J. Starobinski)
 

Mladen Mitar, historian of arts,

introduction for the retrospective exhibition

»Garden of Eden«, Gallery »Ulrich«, Zagreb, 2005.