The artist Sinisa Kashawelski

How did you come to art?

Getting into the world of art came to me as a natural progression from a very young age. I always loved to sketch, draw and sculpt. This later led me through the labyrinths of variety of artistic expressions before I started to settle down into what is characterizing my art today.

Your work combines a variety of styles – how did you develop your technique and personal style?

In a sense, it is a long and arduous journey through the time. The desire, the imagination and the inner dreams that all come from within are determining what you do and where to go at one particular point. It took a lot of experimentation and trial and error till I perfected the technique that I stage on my paintings today. I’ve also studied thoroughly the styles of the old masters whose techniques always fascinated me and challenged me to get close to their impressive stylistic ways of painting.

The development of my personal style went through number of different phases, each one contributing to the other. At the early stages, I got really immersed into surrealism, which style I still nurture today. Overtime I started to add some elements of the Macedonian tradition into it, getting to a point which nowadays characterizes majority of my works.

MANIERE MYSTERIEUSE, 2012, oil painting on canvas, 120×160 cm

You combine your Macedonian origins and contemporary influences – how would you describe your work in general and is it difficult to combine those two parts?

As mentioned in the previous question, after a period of time, it came to me naturally to start adding some of our traditional folklore into my art. These ideas were etching my inner world and my thinking process for a long period of time. Being genetically coded into my soul, they somehow later naturally flowed into my art, perfectly mixing with what you call contemporary influences. It wasn’t hard at all to coin these two parts together, as both in my mind were evoking mysteries which challenged me to merge them into something that the public will really enjoy.

How would you describe the recent Macedonian artistic scene and its development?

I would rather leave this question to be answered by the people that are following the Macedonian artistic scene more closely. In general, for a number of years, the accent is given to the abstract/contemporary art and there is a number of good artists that are working in this field. However, the other directions are also spread across the scene and all together are forming a wide spectrum that caters for the wide audience.

SPERANZE, 2017, oil painting on canvas, 195×114 cm

Which artists do you admire?

I do admire a number of artists coming from variety of artistic periods. Speaking of technique and composition in general, I like the old masters, in particular Caravaggio, Rembrandt, Rubens, Vermeer and others. Needless to say I also admire the works of Salvador Dalí, René Magritte,Andrew Wyeth, Istvan Sandorfi etc. They all left very deep traces within the history of art and I think that it is very hard to pass by them.

Allegoria patrui mei, 65×80 cm

What have been the highlights of your artistic career?

I had a number of highlights in my career, in particular over the last five years when I started to exhibit my works all around the world. As a reward to my efforts, I won number of prizes out of which I’d like to mention a few:Konstantin Mazev Award, a Medaille de Bronze and Medaille d`Argent by Salon des Artistes Français, Grand Palais, Paris, as well as two Gold Medals by Salon des Artistes Français and Salon National des Beaux-Arts in Paris, the 1st Place Award by Palm Art award in Germany and 1st Absolute Prize in the Paintings section, Marchionni Prize, Italy.

Looking back at your early works, how do you think about them today?

I guess that you can always look at your works with two different pairs of eyes. From where you stand today, it is naturally to think that you could’ve done some of them better. The other view is the emotional aspect that is telling you that these works were part of your journey and the state of the world that you’ve been into at the time. As anything in life, all of it is just part of the jig puzzle that is forming the big picture as we’re travelling through the space and time.