JIMON

Jaksa Calasan

Interview by Jimon

  1. Where did you grow up, and where do you live currently?  I grew up in Yugoslavia, a country that no longer exists. I currently live in a Montenegro, on the coast of Adriatic Sea in a small town of Bar.
  1. Did you have any official training for art? I graduated from Art Academy at University of Novi Sad, Serbia.
    1. How long have you been making art and what lead you to start? As far as I can remember, I have been drawing since childhood. I also grew up in a family that nurtured and revered art.

  1. Does you work come from imagination or real life experiences? From real life experience with imagination.
  1. How did you acquire your style? My style is very spontaneous and to be original at all costs. Expressing my ideas, emotions and impressions is what is important to me.
  1. What influences you as an artist? I have grown up in a family that nurtured art and my mother is an art historian. As a child I was surrounded by artists, music, and movies, which had the greatest impact on forming my own artistic expression. My ideas drive primarily from the nature and people that are in my surroundings.
  1. What kinds of art hang on the walls of your home? There is work from friends who are artist, art that I have inherited. (I also have a few pieces of my own, per my wife’s request).
  1. How do you describe success as an artist?  What I consider as having greatest significance is to be recognized by one’s peers, but most importantly, that he or she be satisfied with the art he or she makes.
  1. Do you have a place/person/thing that you visit for inspiration? I don’t “pursue” inspiration, but rather am inspired by relationships that I make and maintain, and by nature that surrounds me.
  1. Name three things you can’t live without in your studio? Brush, canvas and color. Of course, internet is very important, literature, artist’s monograph and coffee.
  1. If you could have dinner with 3 artists living/dead who would be at your table? David Hockney, Pierre Bonnard, and if I could choose other artists, then I would like to dine with F.M. Dostoyevski, but if it had to be a painter, then it would be Rene Magritte.
  2. What forth-coming projects and or exhibitions do you have scheduled? In September I have an exhibition in my hometown Bar.
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