Exhibition of Vasko Tashkovski in Daut Pasha Hamam

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NI The National Gallery of Republic of North Macedonia has the special honour to announce the retrospective exhibition of the academician Vaso Tashkovski, a leading representative of surrealism, fantastic painting, ecological and cosmic themes in the Macedonian figurative art, with a wide affirmation in the Balkans, Europe and the world.

According to his contemporaries, Vasko Tashkovski’s contribution to contemporary Macedonian art at the very beginning of his work is emphasized by following his own quiet and unobtrusive artistic path that allowed him to most appropriately transcribe the author’s manuscript continuously until today to a painting that is classic according to its plastic structure, and at the same time surrealistically fantastic in a poetic sense, with a precise meticulous drawing and a lavish tonal palette. In particular, the exceptionalism, i.e. the separation of his multifaceted work for itself, but also in the specific historical environment, is seen in the persistent research of these surreal fantastic visions as a constant challenge, a commitment that is constantly updated with new themes through which it is recognizable as a unique image and phenomenon in contemporary Macedonian painting.
Regarding the significance of Tashkovski outside our country, the fact that he is the only Macedonian author (and at the time, one of the two Yugoslav painters represented in this edition) is inevitable, which is presented in the edition “Painters of Fantasy” (from Hieronymus Bosch to Salvador Dali from 1974, published by Phaidon, and selected by William Gount. (William Gount, Fantastic Painting by Hieronymus Bosch to Salvador Dali, Fedon, London, 1974, and Grafički zavod Hrvatske, 1980).


Moving from the original associative surreal mysterious landscapes that are dehumanized, conceived as metaphysical desolation after catastrophe, he turns into science-fiction cosmic mysteries of the psychological subconscious, and the obsession with the near and distant past, man in the city and the prophetic, the desolation and the landscape, that is, man’s engaged relationship and influence on nature. Vasko Tashkovski’s painting vision focuses on human outings in space, daydreaming and vision, escape from neurotic times in imaginary three-dimensional landscapes, often with a wide-open horizon with sky and earth in the background, while ruined structures, floating exotic vegetation oases, combined with biologically-mechanized mechanical structures are placed in the foreground.
The impacts and reflections from surrealism and fiction are transformed by the author into his autochthonous language with specific elements presented through several art disciplines: painting, watercolor and drawing, with an impressive number of works: about 1,000 paintings in watercolor, over 3.500 1,000 drawings, as well as graphics, scenography and over 12,000 daily disciplined conceptual sketches.
Vasko Tashkovski is born on August 31th 1937 in Nizopole, Bitola. He completed his middle school education in the art high school in Skopje in 1958. He graduated in the Academy of Applied Art in Belgrade in 1964. From 1966 to 1991 he works as scenographer of Macedonian Television. Apart from painting in oil technique, he worked with water color, drawings and graphics. He has realized over 50 independent exhibitions and participated in a number of group exhibitions in the country and abroad. He is a winner of many awards and appreciations, among which SUBNOR “July 4th”, Belgrade (1977), the October award in Skopje, RNM (1978), Medal of labour of the Presidency of SFRY. Belgrade (1980) etc. In 1994 he becomes a correspondence member in MANU.
The exhibition with be open on 21.10.2021 at 8 p.m. in the Daut Pasha Hamam and will include paintings, aquarelles and drawings of each creative phase of the artist.

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