Reč dve o Tijani – A few words about Tijana 2012

Curator: This is "A Few Words about Tijana," a triptych created in 2012 by Dragan Ilić Di Vogo, seemingly an acrylic on canvas. It's… well, what’s your immediate take? Editor: My first thought is, "wow, that's a lot happening," almost overwhelming. There are so many layers and little details – a sort of dreamy, slightly melancholic fairytale. But with fighter planes? Talk about juxtaposition. Curator: Right? It's this intense personal symbolism woven into a wider social narrative. Note the fractured fairytale castle mirroring that kind of dreamy haze, or those checkered cubes littered at the bottom, feeling slightly dislocated and maybe... risky, almost gambling with the fairytale itself? The birds, too, feel quite symbolic—are they doves of peace or just an ominous harbinger? Editor: I see it! Given the title, I wonder who Tijana is, how she feels about that castle, the birds, the airplanes. She is dead center, partially nude, clutching her head like the thoughts swirling in her head is too much. Does the road across the top suggest a kind of... journey that Tijana needs to be ready for? Curator: Ilic Di Vogo often grapples with memory, loss, and the intersection of personal history and larger socio-political currents in his work, very specifically in war torn Europe. The painting serves as a kind of psychological landscape. A bit like flipping through someone’s mind… but also maybe flipping through the cultural artifacts we all carry with us. Editor: So Tijana becomes a vessel for collective experience? Perhaps a commentary on how individual trauma connects with broader social anxieties during those times. Look how Di Vogo utilizes this fluid art effect, bleeding all the forms into one another. All very telling in its depiction of psychological drama. Curator: Exactly. And that’s where the power lies. He doesn't offer a neat conclusion but rather an open invitation to ponder our own “words about Tijana,” or, more broadly, our shared history and fragile mental landscape. Editor: It's powerful stuff. Definitely leaves you thinking, grappling...trying to piece things together long after you've moved on from it.