Summary
Paja Jovanović: Memoirs of a painter - part one
prepared by Vladimir Petrović
Paja Jovanović, one of the most important Serbian painters of all time, began writing memoirs in the first half of the twentieth century. Their first part was finished after the Second World War, and Milutin Milanković, a well-known Serbian astronomer and physicist, gave him great support when working on the manuscript. Although the publication of the book had already been agreed upon, due to a series of circumstances it was not printed at that time. The manuscript remained almost completely forgotten in the legacy of Milutin Milanković in the SAN Archive. After more than seven decades, he is now coming to light for the first time.
Presenting the circumstances of his youth in this romanticized autobiography, Paja Jovanović at the same time gives us a vivid account of social, political and cultural conditions in Austria-Hungary, mostly in his native Vršac. Brilliantly written miniatures about the picturesque, now completely disappeared world of Banat combine with the image of a young man's encounter with the metropolis. Paja Jovanović begins studying at the Vienna Academy of Fine Arts. The first painterly triumphs, but also defeats, first loves, equally love crashes, as well as attempts to find one's place in the turbulent art world, received a masterly portrayal with a lot of spirit and no less humor.
"Now, when I read it again in its entirety, I saw that the composition of the work is also masterful. There are no weak points at all, and once you start reading, you don't let go of your hands. And whoever reads it once, will read it many more times..."
Milutin Milanković (in a letter to Paja Jovanović, 1948)
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