Page 5 - DjordjeAndrejevićKun

Đorđe Andrejević Kun was born on March 31, 1904 in Wrocław (German Empire, today Poland). He was a Yugoslav and Serbian painter
and graphic artist, a member of the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts. His fight for student and worker rights prior to World War
II, the participation in the Spanish Civil War and the National Liberation Fight served as a strong inspiration for the great creative opus
that would simultaneously represent one strong document of those times. The history he directly witnessed is kept in painting of rich
color value, the mastery of displaying long scale of emotions, the atmosphere of grand dramatics – for example, the pathos or the
waiting silence, and the masterful feeling for composition of small masses and surfaces as well as the large ones.

From his father Veljko Andrejević Kun, who worked as an engraver in one of the most significant German engraving firms, he inherited
an artistic trait that was discovered by a teacher from Berlin in Kun’s early age. In Belgrade, where he moved with his family in 1914,
he finished printing craft and afterwards learned painting at the Art school in period 1920 – 1925. Dorđe received a scholarship from
a benefactor, the Belgrade merchant Ilija Rankić, for further improving his painting in Italy, Venice, Florence, Milan and Rome. He
continued his studies in Paris until his first independent exhibition in 1931. The same year he won at the competition for the coat of
arms of the city of Belgrade among 56 Yugoslav artists in the contest. Kun’s coat of arms is still the official coat of arms of Belgrade
today. The World Congress of Writers in Moscow defined the term “socialist realism” recommending that the everyday life of workers
was to become a central artistic theme. In this Kun, as a true leftist, found an inspiration and turned toward graphics that he considered
was the suitable technique for the new theme.

In the Spanish Civil War he fought against fascism in the International brigades and two maps of graphics, “Blooded gold” and “For
freedom”, were created in this period. Two artworks inspired by the participation in fights in Spain are exhibited in the east foyer of
the Palace Serbia in oil-on-canvas technique, “The shooting” and “No pasarán“ (English “You shall not pass”). He published the map
“Partisans” after the World War II.

In his artworks he used monumental compositions to show crimes of the occupier in the World War II, scenes from army life in war
conditions and scenes of reconstruction and rebuilding of the country. On the occasion of establishing the new Yugoslav state at the
Second Session of the Anti-Fascist Council for the National Liberation of Yugoslavia (Serbian: AVNOJ) in Jajce in 1943, he made
conceptual solutions for the coat of arms and badges of honor of the young state. The title of the professor of the Academy of Fine
Arts in Belgrade and the rector of the Academy of Art completed his rich professional career. He died in Belgrade at the age of 59 on
January 17, 1964.