(From Calendar Millennium Almanac by
Charles Billich, 2000)
I was born on the sixth of September 1934 when Istria was
Italian and part of The Venice.
At home we spoke Venetian, Italian, Croatian and German. I
identified with the aesthetic symbols of the regime and as a child and
adolescent I was enchanted by Art Deco, for some Fascist art, for others still
"Futurism".
In 1945, through a plot between Roosevelt and Stalin, I was
passed, together with the whole of Istria, behind the Iron Curtain. There I
was exposed to a fresh cultural climate full of vitality but unfortunately
immersed in the sadness of the marxist idiocy. I went to Rijeka Grammar. Later
the Institute of Economy, where we learned about business the Russian way,
Marxism-Leninism, a form of boring profane catechism. Also Logistics and
Ballistics, meaning terrorism, export of revolutions and global communist
victory. Mathematics, Algebra, Geometry, etc.
The first drawing lessons at the Classical Lyceum, together
with humanities.
Miraculously I was accepted by the Corp de Ballet of Rijeka's
Opera, and this offered me the most exhilarating, though short-lived dancing
career. I still take around the world my inventory of metaphysical
choreographic ideas based on ballet. Absurd hyperbolae which include
exaggerations on human limits but exclude gravity. Student and dancer, I was
drawn also to writing and illustration, and found a niche in the minority
publishing in Istria, consisting of a daily, various magazines and books on
the Italian language. I was fascinated by journalism and soon, abusing my
position, I found ways of expressing my dissent by publishing surreptitiously
"erroneous" ideas contrary to the system.
One day my seditious activities were uncovered, so I attempted
to flee to Italy. However, the girl with whom I wanted to share this
adventure, as the good spy she turned out to be, betrayed me and I got
ambushed and arrested.
It was 1952. A Slovenian communist court dealt me ten years of
political Gulag. The time I spent in prison, ignoring incidentals such as
starvation, chill-bite and sadism, was very useful. I met many intellectuals
who were political lifers. They had status and certain liberties and could
obtain books from the outside. They delighted teaching me languages, art
history and many practical skills.
During the periods of punitive isolation I had plenty of time
for meditation and to make mental catalogues of many cosmic messages that are
still supplying much subject matter. Strangly I never painted the conditions
of that episode, but even then I disliked social realism, which I perceived as
an arm of official propaganda.
As Maribor jail was a vast penitentiary and contained its own
theatre, I had the opportunity of learning about set design. I soon became
designer in charge and sure enough there are still histrionic traces to my
work, lots of them!After only a couple of years of this purgatory — here's the
best instant in my life, the maddest euphoria, joy irrepressible, orgasm most
potent: sudden and immediate amnesty! How can one appreciate freedom without
having tasted slavery? I'm grateful to fate.
The flight into Austria was a success! I stayed in Austria two
years, painting murals for a
brewery and going to Salzburg Art School. It was there that I felt, maybe
moved by the baroque magic and the beauty of the city, that I had a certain
God-given gift. That's stating humility and vanity at the same time! It was
there and then that I opted for a future as an artist, throwing to the wind
more cautious career options.
Even as student I've always had the good fortune to be able to
survive with the sale of a painting here and there, at times supplementing
with odd jobs like psychiatric nurse, morgue attendant, taxi driver,
decorator, restaurer, restaurateur, portrait painter and art director. Once I
got an offer to work on a film with Roger Vadim, "Night games". It was about
an artist.
I was the stunt artist who had to paint her pictures and
create her artistic development. What schizofrenia!
As it was being filmed in Manila, I enrolled at the University
of the Philippines Art School where I remained for some time. Art studies
there were a euphemism. But I was lucky to be invited to join an elite group
of painters; patrician homes put on sumptuous extemporanea for us. Working
bee workshops with the best models, orgiastic banquets and "mariendas",
picturesque surroundings, orchestras. Surprisingly, out of all this decadence,
I.was managing some pretty strong and exotic stuff.:
In 1983 I was invited by the City of Spoleto to exhibit during
the Festival of Two Worlds. This became an annual pilgrimage. In 1987,
together with the composer Giancarlo Menotti, I was awarded the coveted
Spoleto Prize. The "Cityscape" concept was born just there, in Spoleto,
a walled-in city that conceals so much beauty. I found in Spoleto the way of
exposing city secrets. Ignoring walls and obstructions. Deliberately evidencing choices. Manipulating
reality. An obsession that I transposed to larger cities, from Sydney
to New York, from Rome to Düsseldorf.
1988 saw me as the Official Artist of the Australian Bicentennial and I
followed part of the First Fleet route, the one that brought English convicts
to colonize our great Continent. I learned some ropes and how to climb the
shrouds with all my art supplies. With few resulting works but lots of
thematic reserve for future marine work. In 1990 I was artist in residence at
Lotrscak Castle, guest of the Museum of Zagreb, Capital city of Croatia.
Post-communist Croatia is rapidly becoming the cradle of middle-european
culture and it's all there to discover and love.
To work and exhibit in various parts of the world, overcoming logistic and
adaptational difficulties through living in various Australian States, in
Italy, Croatia, Japan, France, is a useful agony for eluding the "Everyday".
The various influences, impulses and cultures are symbiotic with an inclusion
into the life-work, although not always visibly so.
As well, the enriching of the visual patrimony through shows and galleries
proffers new role models to emulate, subjects and ideas, refines the "metier"
and confirms the individuality. I hope to be always allowed to be an
international artist to mark an exceptional historic era, an era of
ecumenicity and brotherhood at a thrilling moment in time. A moment charged
with an exalted understanding between nationalities, races, cultures and
religions. I'm happy to announce my appointment as Sports Artist of the year
for 2000, a coveted title with a 20 year tradition, conferred by the United
States Sports Academy.
Source:
- Charles Billich, Calendar Millennium
Almanac, 2000