In Remembrance of Karlo Napravnik
(Humpolec, August 24, 1909-Golnik, September 25, 1957)
In the Vršac Municipal Museum, the numerous works of Karlo Napravnik are preserved; for a relatively short time, he worked as a curator of the Art Department and as a conservator of this museum. The works, actually, include a large number of drawings, book illustrations, theater scene designs, costume designs and a number of paintings, altogether the largest collection of Napravnik's work in any museum collection, apart from the family collection. The artist bequeathed the Museum with most of these words at the very end of his life, in the years immediately preceding 1957. Today, the Vršac Municipal Museum has the honor and pleasure of ceremonially marking the one hundred year anniversary of the birth of this great artist.
Karlo Napravnik was born in Humpolec (Czech) on August 24, 1909. He arrived in Vršac during his childhood. In this town, he finished high school. Then he enrolled in the Royal Academy of Art in Zagreb in 1928, in the department of painting. After successfully completing his study, he enrolled in two semesters of "special painting school" with Professor Marino Tartalja. In order to perfect his skills, he sojourned in Italy and Austria.
He began his professional career in 1937 in Belgrade as an assistant artist in the editorial board of the "Vreme" newspaper, and also as an assistant in the "Sport" newspaper. For a time he lived in Subotica, and after the liberation he returned to Vršac where he worked as an artist in the Municipal Board of the AGITPROP until March, 1951. From June, 1951, he was employed at what was then the Folks Museum, where he was the director of the Art Department.
His work was exhibited in Belgrade in 1934, 1935 and 1936, and he held independent exhibitions in Vršac in 1947 and 1953. He participated in the exhibitions of artists from Vojvodina in Novi Sad, but also in the art exhibitions in Banat in Kikinda, Zrenjanin, Pancev? and Vrš?c.
In addition to exhibitions, Napravnik was also dedicated to his work at the "Sterija Theater" in Vršac, where he worked for years as an honorary set designer.
He illustrated some 200 books, and for certain editions he also did sketches for the book covers and dust jackets. He worked mostly with the publishers at Matica srpska, Bratstvo-Jedinstvo, Libertatea and a few other publishing houses.
The works of this artist number more than 2100 - oil-on-canvas paintings, graphics, drawings, paintings on paper, scene designs, sketches for book covers...
After a long and painful illness, Karol Napravnik died in the hospital in Golnik (Slovenia) on September 25, 1957. He is buried at the Orthodox cemetery in Vršac.
The Vršac Municipal Museum, though busy preparing for the 150 year anniversary of the birth of the painter Paja Jovanovic, will also mark the one hundred year anniversary of the birth of Karlo Napravnik. For that occasion, an exhibition is being prepared of works that have been obscure until now, rarely presented to the general public - paintings, sketches for scene designs, costume design sketches, drawings, graphics...
The entire work of Napravnik is reflected in the wide variety of techniques and interests which occupied him in his professional life. In addition to classical art in the oil-on-canvass technique, Gouache, and aquarelle, of which he left 150 works behind, the multi-faceted talent of the artist can be seen in many other aspects of art.
The impressive number of book illustrations, title-pages, mostly in the publications of the Matica srpska, shows the strength of his drawings, the certainty of his ideas and their remarkable actualization. The refreshing quality of these sketches which illustrated a wide variety of books is still captivating today because of its compact style in execution.
Likewise, the refreshing humor and originality that were unmistakably connected to Napravnik's name in numerous caricatures, we can still find today in the newspapers where he used to work.
Of special interest are the valuable portraits he left behind in his work. The portraits of Feliks Mileker, Boško Tokin, Rastko Rašajski... these were "living records" of the intellectual elite of the city. In the private collection today, among other things, one can find special portraits of his parents and also several remarkable self-portraits.
Some of his landscapes, painted memorials of the towns of Vršac (Construction of the Stadium, Vršac Motif from 1946), Subotica (Subotica Covered in Snow from 1935, A Street in Subotica), Makarska (Makarska, A Road in Makarska, after 1930), are interesting in their vision and realization, and can be used today as testimony to times past, in addition to their qualities as works of art. In terms of Napravnik's oil-on-canvas paintings, expression is obviously the formula he finally adopted.
His well-known graphics, in the spirit of social art and intimism, are entitled: The Protest, Tug-Boats, A Workers' Celebration, Into Uncertainty, Studio of Nudes, The Weekend...
Fundamentally, Napravnik was an exceptional draftsman. His series entitled "Old Vršac", his scenes of Dubrovnik and many other drawings, including even those from his student days, all highlight his exceptional skill.
His lyricism in the definition of linear study, where Napravnik was indeed unsurpassable, has long since been noted by his contemporaries and by connoisseurs of art. Countless drawings - landscapes, the town center of Vršac, imaginary visions, and also costume sketches, posters and scene designs - actually contain a single note of the characteristic lyricism which is constantly associated with him.
The largest number of the works of Karlo Napravnik is preserved today in the family collection in Belgrade and in the Vršac Municipal Museum. A certain number of works can be found at the "Sterija National Theater" in Vršac, the Museum of Modern Art in Belgrade, the National Museum in Niš, the Gallery of the Matica srpska in Novi Sad, the hospital in Golnik in Slovenia, and in many private collections.
