Personal Portrait

The first time I met Aleksandar Cvetković was at the begining of the ’80s, upon his return to the „White City“ from a tour of the United States. One’s first intrusion on the privacy of a successful painter’s studio, and Sasha was certrainly successful (his biography already included numerous exhibits and awards, as ewll as works on permanent display in museums), is always accompained by a feeling of uneasiness. Experioence had taught me that an artist’s vanity can be unlimired. Today, when I recall our first encounter, I can only remember Sasha’s loud, sincere laughter and the tremendous energy he radiated. The Informal kindness of a good host and direct approach soon removed every possibility of protocolary, conventional socializing. In short, we became friends. We measure our friendship in years. An entire lifetime could be compressed into those years. And more than that. when someone asks me who Aleksandar Cvetković is and what exactlyhe is like, I stop and think. Not because I cannot find an answer but because it is imposseible to single out the most important facts from an ocean of data. His life reminds me of a richly embroidered carpet on which each design and color is equally important.

I could talk about the „heroic ’70s“, the time of Belgrade rock bands and the cult of the „Silhouettes“, band in which Sasha played bass. Those were the times of travel, tours, „Marshall“ and „Orange“ amps purchased from our first salaires, vinyl LPs and without video clips because „music should be listened to and lived, not watched“. Or maybe about Sasha’s first exhibits, successes, publicity, euphoria… his trips, New York, the ultimate obsession: the sidewalks og Greenwich Village, Tribecca, Broadway and all the galleries of the world. The magic Big Apple, glorious and filthy at the same time, but alive, pulsating like some organism. It creeps up on someone who becomes a part of it, living and breathing in unison. Julian Schnabel, a discovery – When I only come to think of how grieved we were when he left Castelli’s and moved to the Pace Gallery. We interpreted that move as treason. And then there were endless evenings permeated by scent of tobacco smokeand booze, with Coltrane and Eroll garner in the background. Jazzheads in a multichord prayer. „Jazz and Orthodox Christianity as a direct link to God“, we used to say. The ritual of carefully placing the vinyl disc on the turntable, studious reading of the info on the sleeve: dates and names of musicians. Recording wizard Rudy Van Gelder. Everything was inportant, Poems and  stories by Bukowsky. Sasha admired his sincerity and believed him.

Dawn on the Danube, the monumental silence of the Great River, the magic of fluid looking-glass, the beauty od Ada Žilova island, the reeds, submerged stumps, water lilies and birds in the sky, all this still lives on in us. Sasha was fascinated by the river and the wild beauty of nature, which provided a refuge and inspiration at the same time. Fishing, “the most beautiful sport in theb world“, a combination of patience and skill, plum brandy from flask to help „warm up“, muddy finger used with the same relaxed detachment to grab a sandwich or stick bait on the hook. A magical Deliblato Sands that first must be lived and then dreamed. I could talk about his love for everything alive, regardless of whether it is a blade of grass or human being. „Beauty should be sought in everything because life only has aestetic justification “, I used to say. Sasha lives such a life. Doubts, restlessnes, eternal reassessments, „we can always do better and more“, he said. sasha possessed an enormus amount of energy, he had eruptions of creativity after which he would withdraw in solitude to the walls of some medieveal Serbian monastery which would pass the hi, some of the contemplative Byzantine spirit of times long gone by. The innumerable days spent in Sasha’s studio helpedme comprehend the magic of the act of creation. I enjoyed watching him paint so sovereingly, with such precision  and speed without a break, for hours on end. The joy of painting. painting as a form of prayer, described by the author Šejka longago. And all those people: mutual friends, collectors, art lovers, poeple from galleries… they came and went, some stayed on, they all had their own stories, sensibilities and wishes.

Therefore, I could not say what the most important thing in the life of an artist could be, I dare not draw a sketch of my friend because the painting of his life is so rich that to extract anything from it would mean ruining it entirely. It is easer for me to answer that the privacy of an artist does not belong to his audience, while I hopethat the real art lovers contemplatingSasha’s paintings know how to percieve part of this privacy in them.    

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