Recently, I received a book about a Croatian designer whose work I greatly admire. Mihajlo Arsovski, was born in 1937 in Skopje, Macedonia, to a family of pre-war leftist revolutionaries. He studied art history and architecture in Zagreb. Many of his posters from the 60s contain subtle criticism, resistance to the ruling ideology and demystification of the cult of Yugoslavian leader Josip Tito. Arsovski somehow managed to avoid being sucked into the pitfalls of Communist propaganda.
On one of the collages that Arsovski for the student movement of 1968, the government uses the colored flags. In these places the paint dramatic scenes clips from the street, fotoportrete young women, loving couples, a young man wearing sunglasses with a five-pointed star. On the other hand, the collage of 1964. below documents the work action as a counterweight to face peeks girls wearing sunglasses. For the International festival of student theater, however, combines these different elements: the tram ticket Zagreb electric tram, photographs of the protagonists then very popular group 4M, with quotations from Ionesco’s “Bald Soprano.”
Arsovski is well known for posters for the ITD Theatre in Zagreb. He developed a visual language using typography, collage and photomontage as the core elements of his methodology.
The book, Arsovski by Dr. Jasna Galjer, an art historian, is only published in Croatian, but the images are well worth the price and attention.
[See yesterday’s Nightly Daily Heller on Salvador Dali’s folly.]
