Milena Jovicevic

Milena Jovicevic, born in  1976 in Cetinje, Montenegro. She graduated from Faculty of Fine Arts, Cetinje in 1999. had specialization at Ecole Supérieure des Beaux- Arts, Le Mans, (1999-2000),  France, then graduated from Beaux- Arts in Paris 2004. and was at postgraduated studies at the same school (2004-2005). She got MFA at the FLU, Cetinje in 2008. and PhD at University of Arts, Belgrade, Serbia 2012. Milena exhibited in Cetinje, Podgorica, Paris, Berlin, London, New York, Antwerp, Istanbul, Beijing, Moscow, Barcelona, Bergamo, Arezzo, Rome, Florence, Saint Petersburg, Basel, Dresden, Bucharest, Vaduz, Belgrade, Zagreb, Sarajevo, Tirana... She participated to several residency programs and symposiums and has won numerous local and international awards. Her works are in public and private collections all over the world. She works as professor at Faculty of Fine Arts Cetinje, Montenegro.

 

“Artist working with paint, but in a more socio- political context, recognizes the painting’s potential to transgress the limits of the canvas edge toward a startling experimental wall sculpture: she rolls, tears, and folds different materials onto the canvas in order to maximize its natural qualities. Jovicevic is clearly attracted to attitudes and situations that provoke an extreme visceral answer. She is interested in developing and capturing the potency of the paint versus the subject- which is exactly what the paintings on display do. They hold up a mirror to both the banality of urban life and solitude of glamour, giving order to the barrage of mass media images and information that confront us daily. In Jovicevic’s fairyland, enchantment and disenchantment coexist. These paintings are really vanitas, made from uninflected slicks of bright inks and pain-giving them a hermetically sealed, impenetrable perfection. While Jovicevic’s paintings have always emphasized their luscious surfaces and simplified forms, the Sugar series on display possesses a strong melancholic beauty” Suzie Walshe, NY Arts magazine, 2010.

 

“Milena Jovicevic does work that specifically references gender issues significant to the local community, referencing the patriarchal society in Montenegro and the great divide between women of the older and younger generation. But because these issues can also be understood on a more global level, they have universal application and significance to a wider audience. I think this range of relevance is what often makes good art-the fact that it can be read and understood on many levels gives it a much greater depth. In her performances and interactive works of art Milena observes how everything in our society is vulgarized – whether it is relating to sex, objectification, consumption, etc. She draws attention to that fact using humor and irony to draw the viewer in, and challenge his or her received ideas about those aspects of society” Amy Bryzgel, Peforming The East, 2013.