Interior of a Room, c. 1933
Stojan Aralica (1883 – 1980)
Tempera on cardboard
46 x33 cm
sign. d. r.
Inv. No. 21/01
The painting was made during the artist’s stay in Zagreb, after 1933 and after his return from Paris. Landscapes and figures in the interior were his favourite topics. Although he had no studio then, Aralica diligently worked and his opus from that time is full of images from everyday life. Interior of a Room is one of those works and has the characteristic colours from the artist’s Parisian period. The painting from the SAC can be considered the other half of the Interior (1933) now in the Pavle Beljanski Memorial Collection in Novi Sad. The artist fashioned forms with rapid strokes and pastose coating, simultaneously structuring a shallow perspective. The colours are intensive, warm and emanate a specific atmosphere of lightheartedness.
Stojan Aralica. – He was born in Škare, Lika. After graduating from Teachers’ College in Osijek he turned to painting. In 1909 he travelled to Munich to attend private classes with Henrich Knirr. From 1910 to 1914 he was enrolled at the Academy in the class of professors Carl von Marr and Ludwig von Herterich. In 1920 he had his first solo exhibition in Zagreb. From 1925 to 1933 he lived in Paris and exhibited at the Salon d’automne, Salon des Tuilleries and Salon des indépendents. His oeuvre can be divided to Munich, Paris, Zagreb and Belgrade periods. At the time of his studies in Munich his style was academic with some elements of the Secession. Paris marked the period of his artistic maturation, a process which reached its conclusion in Zagreb (1933 – 1941), when he produced paintings resembling the fauvist expression. Aralica then fully joined the artistic movements in Yugoslavia. The Belgrade period could be considered as a zenith of his artistic career, especially during the 1950s.
Aralica was a member of the Association of Serbian Artists, a full member of the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts and a corresponding member of the Yugoslav Academy of Sciences and Arts.
