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Lot Essay
Zoran Antonio Music was born in 1909 in the Italian town of Gorizia, bordering Slovenia. His childhood was marked by constant change as a result of the political climate in Eastern Europe. While he studied both at the Academy of Arts in Zagreb and in Madrid, Music was forced to return to Dalmatia at the outbreak of civil war in Spain. Music moved to Venice in 1940, where he painted church frescos, developing a style based on Byzantine art, the trecentro Italian painters Cimabue and Giotto, and the early Renaissance master Piero della Francesca. He was deported to Dachau concentration camp in 1944, an experience he recounted in later paintings.
In the years following the war, Music embarked on the most celebrated theme in his oeuvre, the motivos Dalmata. In these canvases he explored his own nomadic upbringing through an archaic style in the landscape of his youth. In René de Solier's catalogue of Music's works, the artist is praised for this new theme "[he] used to advantage the rich substance of remembered things but, in so doing, has succeeded in evolving an unmistakable and truly personal style" (in Music Rome, 1955, p. 11). In the present painting, the archaic influences derived from Venice appear in his style and use of color. His composition is flat, comprising a shallow foreground marked by taupe brushstrokes, a middle ground occupied by the moving horses and a background of dappled hills beneath a hazy sky. The patterned hides and intimate grouping infuse the horses with life as they move across the canvas with a gentle stillness. His palette is muted and soft, focusing on shades of yellow, maroon, green, brown and gray; the "mute opaqueness shuts in a light which, halo-like, follows along" (ibid., p. 10) and adds depth to this serene landscape.
In the years following the war, Music embarked on the most celebrated theme in his oeuvre, the motivos Dalmata. In these canvases he explored his own nomadic upbringing through an archaic style in the landscape of his youth. In René de Solier's catalogue of Music's works, the artist is praised for this new theme "[he] used to advantage the rich substance of remembered things but, in so doing, has succeeded in evolving an unmistakable and truly personal style" (in Music Rome, 1955, p. 11). In the present painting, the archaic influences derived from Venice appear in his style and use of color. His composition is flat, comprising a shallow foreground marked by taupe brushstrokes, a middle ground occupied by the moving horses and a background of dappled hills beneath a hazy sky. The patterned hides and intimate grouping infuse the horses with life as they move across the canvas with a gentle stillness. His palette is muted and soft, focusing on shades of yellow, maroon, green, brown and gray; the "mute opaqueness shuts in a light which, halo-like, follows along" (ibid., p. 10) and adds depth to this serene landscape.