Be an Artist

Being the Gardener in the great Garden of one’s own realizations, desires, ideas and even arrogance/haughtiness, arranged plant beds like large and small conversations—not always with and more often without other participants— is like using tiny seeds to create the most fantastic pictures and explosions of colors out of simple human stories, intertwined with the fine subjects of ordinary life, all in the belief that great loves exist. This is just a small but beautiful excuse in the search for one’s own substance, where any period or comma would be superfluous. Punctuation would be nonexistent because in the heart of the author there is no hierarchy nor engineering-like organization, rather it is one big world that is arranged in such a way that in it we can always perceive ourselves and spend our entire life searching for ourselves.

To be able to articulate and perceive what has been achieved in slightly more than 50 years, is like you organized the most amazing birthday party. My abundant gifts are from myself, in presenting them for your viewing. Light has always caught my eye evenly, as a spectrum; it is the light that is noticed first, ostensibly above all from the beloved sun, because of the morning radiance and the heat that keeps us warms us.

The heat is the first to stir the senses and you can remain under its influence for a long time. But being is not enough; being an artist is more than simply being. It is one’s shaping of one’s self, the space that can be transformed into the plane of our artistic endeavor only through the power of talent.

The artist is because he knows something that others don’t.

Bata Knezevic was born in the middle of the last century in Belgrade/ 1947/. He has had a life of adventure - 13 schools in 4 countries in 3 languages - and it's not over yet. By the way, he was repeating the first grade of primary school.

His first stroke of luck happened when he came to the Academy of Applied Arts in Warsaw, where he was mostly engaged in book design, illustration and painting, in the classes of prof. Jan Sencer and prof. Julian Palka. He finished his MA there 1972. He met and interacted with all the significant poster artists in Poland and many others from around the world.

After studying in Poland, he came back to Yugoslavia (a country which, by the way, doesn't exist anymore), where he started creative work in various art sectors. He established studio ATELIER Bata Knezevic, where he printed almost all his posters in screen-printing. He worked for many cultural institutions, publishing houses and theaters all over the same country (which, by the way, doesn't exist anymore).

After this period, his art became very sporadic and relaxed. He became involved in the protection of an endangered species of fish from the Danube (Sturgeon), a river which passes by his house. Screen-printing had the same destiny as Yugoslavia - it was replaced with faster, cheaper and more productive printing techniques.

He has taught graphic and poster design at the Academy of Applied Arts in Belgrade.

Within his studio "Novum Design", with his wife Svetlana, he is involved in the design and production of paper collections. He spends most of his free time gardening, making sculptures in wrought iron, creating mosaics, ceramics working primarily in porcelain and enjoying gastronomy - all expressions of harmony of different flavors and colors. Cooking is closest to painting. It makes his dear friends smile. Without them, all this would not have any sense. For the last few years he has been mostly involved in painting

He has a daughter Hana.
/ Hana is my best design, and she is also an artist/.