Ivona Jurić / Closed Screenplay
Solo exhibition
FROM THE PREFACE OF THE EXHIBITION
Objects are our landmarks in reality, what our consciousness and perception grasp at in order to find our way in the world around us. Ivona Jurić's paintings have so far depicted some seemingly unimportant corners of that world with different objects – an abandoned terrace with an umbrella, a window, a trash can, a corner of an office of a public administration building. There is one anchorage in this seemingly random selection of scenes, and that is the author's consciousness. It is manifested, among other things, in a specific painterly handwriting, which is why the reality depicted in her paintings had simultaneous firmness and flickering, the impression of permanence and temporariness, that bittersweet taste of the affirmation of human existence. While thinking about these paintings, it is impossible for me to avoid associations with an anxious, but also humanistically oriented philosophy of existence that denies some higher meaning of existence (especially the reflections of Sartre's protagonist Nausea, prompted by the consideration of tree roots). Each of Ivona's paintings so far (and in fact, isn't that every more deeply thought-out painting achievement) has been a trace of all the stories that the artist tells herself. And the stories we tell ourselves are also called consciousness. In a way, it is a closed scenario (or, in other words, a "strange loop", as the philosopher and scientist Douglas Hofstadter called human consciousness), which is the title of this cycle. Plants are almost unexceptionally present in Ivona's scenes – whether in pots, or as expanses of mowed fields or as wilderness in which vegetation flourishes uncontrollably, following only its internal laws. All these images are suitable for different narrative interpretations and uploads of different meanings. But nature knows no meaning. The law of growth and proliferation is one reason for the existence of all flora, and this is another strong existentialist emphasis of Ivona Jurić's works. Everything simply exists, and so do we. All the meanings we give to our lives are just fairy tales or, if you will, lies that we cling to and that protect us from the devastating feeling of emptiness.
In Ivona Jurić's recent drawings and watercolours, plants often dominate completely. They have swallowed their context. The law of their growth has become the law of composition of these works. They are alive, fleshy, colorful, vitalistic ornament, an all-pervading life that expands. However, I would not say that the euphoria of growth and energy is expressed here in the eternally cheerful affirmation of oneself. Because life as such knows neither joy nor sadness. It is a principle that does what it does because it cannot do otherwise. Despite this, the ability of our consciousness (that fairy tale from which everything begins) to find meaning and beauty in this principle remains. Ivona Jurić really brilliantly manages to show two views of reality – the distant recording of its laws and the skillful emphasis on the attractiveness of all colors and forms of botanical diversity.
It is especially interesting that, despite this principled disenthusiasm for different plant forms, this completely unromantic view of lovely nature, the artist does not shy away from the possibility of our perception of beauty. Namely, it is not a sin to find beauty in meaninglessness. In this, we can see a beneficial detachment from the phenomena of reality, as well as the rejection of defeatism and pessimism. Like the life of plants that fulfills these formats, the existence of everything (animate and inanimate) is simply a fact without added meaning. It is up to us to extract from it the crumbs of what makes our lives bearable and pleasant. And this is the same, as this painter says, a scenario that we build for ourselves. We can be aware of its construction, as well as the impossibility of getting out of it. Again, we should not carelessly claim that we are completely free in this construction (nor would I dare to touch on the issue of such freedom now), but the very knowledge that we are constantly in it allows us to experience its positive moments more intensely and to take its negative moments more frivolously.
What Ivona Jurić offers is a sensitive and restrained participation in the world, and her paintings, watercolors and drawings are imprints of such a presence and an invitation to the viewer to such a presence. If we understand them in this way, then the pieces of reality on them are parts of ourselves that we can recognize, unite our existence with them, and thus embellish it a little.
Feđa Gavrilović
BIOGRAPHY OF THE AUTHOR
Ivona Jurić was born in 1987 in Zagreb. In 2005, she graduated from the School of Applied Arts and Design. She graduated in painting from the Academy of Fine Arts in Zagreb in 2010 in the class of Professor Duje Jurić. During her studies, she spent three months in Brno, Czech Republic. In 2014, she was a resident of the Cite Internationale des Arts in Paris, in 2015 Air Kaunas in Lithuania, and in 2016 CEEC in China. She is the winner of the Academy of Fine Arts Award in Zagreb for exceptional success during her studies and during the preparation of her graduate thesis. She is the winner of the Croatian Association of Fine Artists Award for Young Artist in 2013, the Grand Purchase Award of the 7th Croatian Watercolor Triennial in 2016 and the Purchase Award of the Cabinet of Graphics of the Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts in 2018.
She is a member of the Croatian Association of Fine Artists (HDLU). She has participated in numerous group and solo exhibitions. She lives and works in Zagreb.
Ivona Jurić's exhibition Closed Scenario is the twelfth in a series of exhibitions dedicated to the academic painter and graphic artist Izabela Šimunović (1970-2010), in which the AMADEO Scene and the Croatian Museum of Natural History present Croatian artists whose works are inspired by natural history themes. In this unique cycle from 2010 until today, the following artists have exhibited: Izabela Šimunović, Vladimir Filakovac, Petar Dolić, Denis Krašković, Maria Ujević, Bane Milenković, Vatroslav Kuliš, Dominique Jurić, Dora Kovačević and Manuela Pauk.
The exhibition is financed by the Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Croatia and the City Office for Culture of the City of Zagreb.
The exhibition can be viewed during the working hours of the Gallery (Mon-Fri: 9 a.m. – 4 p.m., 6 p.m. – 8 p.m., Saturday: 11 a.m. – 4 p.m.) until 30.09.2021.
