ART Habens Art Review ART Habens Art Review - Special Issue #97 | Page 76
ART Habens
Ante Kustre
layers - psychological, metaphorical, narrative.
In composing my individual works as well as in
introducing more complex entities, my
aspiration to narrative is obvious, sometimes - I
think - too much, but it is deep in my nature
that, in whatever medium I am, at the end of
the thread, I tell a story. To say something
worth telling. Probably this stems from the
influence of literary and film narrative in my
artistic formation. But sometimes it does not
make sense to me, or I have no one to say , so I
am silent then ( like in performance " White
Silence " at the Almissa Open Air Festival 2015
). Zadie Smith says that autobiography has now
become the main determinant of all artistic
expressions, not just literature. I am inclined to
agree with it completely, and how would not I,
when my work was so soaked with
autobiographical content.
working nights I listen to music, most often the
voices of Scott Walker, Jacques Brel, Nick Cave,
Leonard Cohen, Amalie Rodrigues and Mercedes
Sosa, guitar of Pat Metheny, the trumpet of
Miles Davis, the acordeon of Al di Meola ...... The
piano miniatures of Eric Satie have been
discovered in my 20's and have been following
me ever since, captured by the gravity of my
melancholy. Since the early Dadaist influences I
have never tried to free myself. Magritt's
surrealistic, stiff-looking compositions and
human figures depicted from the back can be
found in my photographs and photo-llages: and
I have recently noticed the discrete influence of
Kurst Schwiters on my assemblages. From the
contemporary I am closest to Maurizio Catellan
for hir provocative humor and playfulness; This
man really has a nose to sniff the right theme
and problem.Of Croatian artists, I have some
touch points with Boris Bucan and Mladen
Stilinovic.
"The Symbols Show The Way," that title of an
English journal Ihad cut out and glued to my
collage 15 years ago. Maybe I use them fairly
often for fear that I will lose ( what I'm so
inclined to do)?! Behind the symbols, there are
always great stories, some important narratives,
and this is perhaps the reason for their
avoidance in today's artistic production. This is
the time of small, personal stories and
testimonies, the time skeptical of the great
words and gestures that have disappointed us
so many times; We all float today - or swim - in
the ocean of signifiers without the significance.
It's OK but sometimes we need the symbol as
the lighthouse, especially if we get drowned. I
think symbols always remain, sometimes
invisible, somewhere in the background of other
Summer
2015
Special Issue
Yes, art works in themselves contain something
mysterious as it is open to change and which is
gradually growing in front of our eyes, almost
like something organic Or it is about growing up
and about the artwork as a spiritual mirror in
which we see how much we have grown up in
the meantime and changed our perceptition,
understanding and sensibility. sensibility. This
may be due to the fact that his work surpasses
the artist himself. It always contains more
meanings and layers than the artist's intent and
awareness involves. It is a very interesting and
refreshing experience to me when faced with
some of my old works, so I can see how new
and current they are right now. They sometimes
resemble the letters or postcards I sent to my
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