Nikola Mihajlović was born in Belgrade in 1986. He has been actively engaged in artistic creation since 2008, initially in the form of street art and later in studio painting. He has participated in and organized numerous international and domestic art projects, exhibiting in a variety of group and solo exhibitions both in Serbia and abroad. Notably, he has participated in two group exhibitions in Berlin, as well as solo exhibitions at the Parobrod Gallery in Belgrade and the Espace Temoin Gallery in Geneva. He is a member of the Street Smart art collective and an external collaborator with the Saša Marčeta Foundation in Belgrade.
His collaboration with the Foundation began in August of this year, when he took part in organizing the first of a series of events called “Balkan Live,” which brought together prominent figures from Belgrade’s contemporary street art scene. Around the same time, he entered the premises of the Balkan Cinema as a painter, where he is currently working on his large solo exhibition, scheduled for the upcoming spring at the same venue.
You can view Nikola Mihajlović’s work on his Instagram profile.
How has this year affected you? How has it changed your plans and activities?
In addition to the fact that 2020 will be most remembered for the COVID-19 virus, it has been significant for me due to important events in both my personal and professional life, which will definitely leave a lasting impression. I will focus here only on the professional aspect: due to the unexpected situation caused by the virus, at the beginning of the year, I lost a potential engagement in China and a possible breakthrough into their art market. My continued collaboration with partners from the “Artetra” organization from Switzerland was also postponed for a better time.
The circumstances forced me to focus primarily on studio work and later on projects across Serbia and the region. I used the isolation time to paint on canvases, where I realized that I had entered a period of stylistic transition, which both affected me and presented a new challenge. Life circumstances were clearly reflected in my artistic expression. With the arrival of better weather, mural works in Belgrade, festivals in Mostar, Gornji Milanovac, the “Art Autumn” in Sombor, and a guest appearance in Sarajevo followed. Then came the start of my collaboration with the “Saša Marčeta” Foundation and the organization of the “Balkan Live” event, followed by relocating my studio to the Balkan Cinema space, where I am currently creating and preparing a large solo exhibition for the spring.
Can you highlight a significant moment that influenced your work – a previous experience that led to obvious changes in your art?
At the beginning of the year, there was a deeply emotional event in my personal life that, in a way, determined future events in that area and left a deep mark on me and someone very close to me. This, combined with everything happening around the COVID-19 virus, affected my artistic expression, which drastically changed from that moment on. I could sense something wanting to come out onto the canvas, but I didn’t know what or how to express it properly. A series of attempts and experiments followed, only some of which were successful. I learned a lot through that process, and now I can say that I’ve regained my confidence and stability.
The paintings currently being created in the attic of the Balkan Cinema, in a kind of improvised studio, are born from the need to express yourself artistically. How compatible are they with your works that are made on facades, streets, abandoned buildings…?
There isn’t much difference. All the works come from the same source and have the same conceptual foundation. That foundation is me, with all my personal characteristics. The main differences are technical in nature or concern the contexts in which the works are created. Walls are canvases that are already “filled” to some extent, while a painter’s canvas represents a piece of infinite emptiness that needs to be brought to life. Both processes aim at a kind of liberation through creation and coexist in parallel within me.
