A song by the cult Yugoslav group Azra, written in 1982, contains the line: “Do you remember Spain? I wonder if you would go to the trenches again…”. The line questions the anti-fascist legacy and raises the crucial question of why even today, nearly nine decades after the Spanish Civil War, we must still remember the Spanish fighters who were the bearers of the revolution and the National Liberation Struggle that followed.

Unfortunately, the Spanish Civil War is largely absent from public discourse today, even from school textbooks. At best, it is reduced to a single paragraph, making it as obscure to many as the idiom “It’s all Greek to me” (Serbian equivalent: špansko selo, “Spanish village”, T/N). Many people are unable to say anything about it, despite the regular activities of the Association of Spanish Fighters 1936–1939 and Friends. From today’s perspective, it seems incredible how alive the ideas of ​​solidarity and the fight for freedom were during the 1930s, when “there was a monster at the door”. Even if that door was not ours at the time, sooner or later, it inevitably knocks on ours as well.

With the shift in social paradigms after the 1990s, history underwent significant changes. Supranational communist ideas were replaced by nationalist discourse, and a new history of conflicts was written to quickly alter the positive image of former friends and strengthen national identity and pride. Victimisation and the construction of a narrative portraying one’s own nation as a historical victim became important elements of national identity, while the memory of victory in the Second World War was suppressed. Precisely this anti-communist discourse and elite-driven nationalism were embodied by intellectuals who had transformed into nationalists. Their commitment to democratic changes was combined with demands for an independent national state. As a result, anything supranational had to be erased, paving the way for the revision of history and the ethnicisation of anti-fascism. For this reason, it is important to remind the public of the unjustly forgotten painter and fighter Đorđe Andrejević Kun, whose biography and artistic oeuvre are inseparable and more relevant than ever in today’s world, when people face increasing poverty, crisis, and fear of new wars and conflicts. They need to be shown historical examples of resistance as motivation for new forms of resistance against the injustices we are witnessing today. Given the world we live in, it is necessary to remember the fight against fascism, the struggle for better conditions for workers and artists, the emancipation of women, and other examples of resistance and courage, because these historical examples of heroes can serve as models for generations to come, inspiring them to fight and resist today’s injustices and abuses that affect the majority of citizens.

At just nineteen years of age, while still a student at the Royal School of Art, Kun created a poster celebrating the First of May, depicting a worker holding a red flag. The poster was designed for the Graphic Workers’ Union, of which he was an active member. The graphic workers displayed it on a tram as an invitation to celebrate the 1^st of May 1923. Although the police quickly removed the poster, it marked the beginning of Kun’s public work, which continued for the rest of his life, spanning four decades. He only adapted his methods of action to suit the changing circumstances, states, and social arrangements.

Kun’s Interwar Activism

During the interwar period, Yugoslavia was one of the most underdeveloped countries and, in terms of living standards, was at the bottom of the European ladder. It was a predominantly rural, industrially backward, and overpopulated agrarian nation facing considerable economic difficulties, further exacerbated by constant political crises, rising national tensions, and the global economic crisis, which severely impacted all underdeveloped agrarian countries in the Balkans. General dissatisfaction in society encouraged artists to become engaged workers and put their artistic activity at the service of creating a new, fairer society. The artistic act becomes an act of resistance. Socially engaged art does not address civil society but rather the people, the lower social strata. For this reason, printmaking – being the fastest and most affordable medium that can be reproduced in large quantities and easily distributed – becomes the dominant medium.

Prints from the Krvavo zlato [Blood-Soaked Gold] map were banned and confiscated by the City of Belgrade immediately after printing. With a cycle of 28 woodcuts, Đorđe Andrejević Kun illustrated a “novel in pictures” through realistic scenes from the life of Bor miners, telling a story about peasants who were forced to abandon cultivating their land, which had been poisoned by factory waste and could no longer feed them. In the struggle for mere survival, they were forced to put on miners’ suits, enter the pits, and endure hard labour to achieve the minimum standard of human existence.

Đorđe Andrejević Kun places the content at the forefront, depicting the harsh and exhausting labour of impoverished peasants who are compelled to work in the mines due to agrarian overpopulation and the inability of their small land holdings to sustain them. In doing so, he creates artistic testimonies of the slow and painful processes of industrialisation and modernisation in the Kingdom of Yugoslavia.

The living and working conditions of the miners in the mine owned by the French Society of Bor Mines – Saint George Concession were similar to those in the French colonies and Kun’s idea was to depict the life of a miner as one of the most difficult occupations, which in socialist Yugoslavia became the avant-garde of the new society, a symbol of progress and the measure of things, because in the first years following the liberation, according to the Soviet model, physical work was glorified as a basic social value and the main “measure” of patriotism. Miners were rewarded with paid vacations at the seaside, decorations, due respect, and mass media coverage of shock workers (udarnik) who were portrayed in the press as morally superior labour heroes. In the late 1940s and early 1950s, films were made about the lives of shock workers, and the socialist competition for higher labour productivity was promoted as a model for everyone to follow in building a better society. In 1949, Alija Sirotanović, a well-known miner from the Breza coal mine, surpassed the previous record by 50 tons, which had been set fourteen years earlier by the famous Soviet miner Alexei Stakhanov from Donetsk. Stakhanov had been an undisputed role model until the conflict with the Soviet Union in 1948, following the Cominform Resolution, when he became a rival and a political opponent who had to be replaced by a domestic and more successful variant of the shock worker. The movement for high labour productivity, initiated by the most famous Yugoslav miner and labour hero Alija Sirotanović, served as a domestic variant of Soviet Stakhanovism. It promoted the creation of a production system “from below”, encouraging workers to share their work experiences and collaborate with experts in developing and planning production.

This map, along with Kun’s other socially themed graphic maps created during the interwar period, was printed in large numbers in the post-war era. Through the process of photozincography, these prints were reproduced according to the original works, clearly reflecting the politics of memory at that time, in contrast to today’s politics of forgetting, characterised by a so-called “self-service syndrome”, where one approaches the past as if in a supermarket, picking only what is immediately needed and only as much is needed.

Considering the fact that even today the Bor mine is owned by a foreign company, it can be concluded that the socialist period was the only time when the mine was managed by domestic subjects. From the current perspective of neoliberalism and the European periphery, where the question of an alternative to capitalism has once again come to the fore, and we are witnessing a new type of colonisation – the colonisation of resources and knowledge – that period seems almost like an anomaly.

On the 10^th of March 1937, the Kingdom of Yugoslavia issued an order prohibiting the recruitment of volunteers and the collection of donations for Spain. Despite this, Kun travelled to Paris for the World Exhibition in August 1937 and then headed to Spain with the intention of joining the liberation struggle. He remained in Spain until May 1938, serving as a volunteer in the 129^th International Brigade of the Đuro Đaković Battalion. Upon his return, inspired by what he had witnessed and experienced in Spain, he created his second map, For Freedom (1938–1939), centered on the theme of the Spanish Civil War. The logical continuation of this combat realism, evident in Kun’s first map, Blood-Soaked Gold (1936–1937) – which realistically depicted scenes from the lives of the Bor miners – was anti-fascism, which became a clearly expressed stance and the primary message of the map For Freedom. This map simultaneously demonstrated the impossibility of separating class struggle from armed resistance to fascism. This connection is underscored by the motto on the map’s first page: “For life, against death”, a phrase by the Spanish poet Rafael Alberti, who shared compatible views with Kun. As a communist and leftist himself, Alberti used his poetry to convey the voice of the oppressed, calling for resistance and struggle in his poems, much like Kun did with his artworks, particularly his prints. Both experienced imprisonment and persecution for their beliefs and were actively involved in the fight against fascism, not only on paper or through their art, but also by providing refuge for persecuted republicans (Alberti) or repurposing a studio in the attic of the Vojislav Ilić Elementary School to produce false documents for volunteers whose trips to Spain were organised by the CPY (Kun). Specifically, fake passports and visas were made in Belgrade, allegedly issued by the administrations of the cities of Belgrade and Zagreb, using a press for stamping illegal passports – a task undertaken Čedo Kapor and Boro Pockov. As issuing visas for Spain was prohibited and exit controls from the country were tightened, they moved across Belgrade, producing false documents, often changing locations to avoid detection, especially given the intense and unpleasant smell from the stamp production process.

In the Spanish Civil War, for the first time, fascist states intervened militarily on European soil and everything indicated that a major confrontation between democratic forces, in the broadest sense, and fascist ones was imminent. It can be said that the war in Spain resulted in the defeat of democracy, but the left in Spain recognised the threat of fascism and was the only group to fight back in an organised manner. As a result, the idea of ​​militant anti-fascism became associated with the left, which gained the necessary experience during the Spanish Civil War. The fight against fascism continued in Yugoslavia after the end of the civil war in Spain. Of the over 1,700 Yugoslav volunteers, of whom 600 lost their lives in Spain, many represented valuable potential in the People’s Liberation Struggle during the Second World War. The experience of the Spanish Civil War was also formative for Kun, and this continuous influence can be clearly traced in the above-mentioned graphic series For Freedom, originally conceived as a three-volume work composed of 36 woodcuts, though only the first part was realised, as noted on the title page. Each of the 12 sheets has its own individual description, yet together they form a homogeneous narrative that, much like a graphic novel or a novel in pictures, bears witness – almost in a style reminiscent of comic strips – to the suffering and struggle of a people determined to confront the enemy.

Stylistically, compared to the previous map (Blood-Soaked Gold), we can observe greater expressiveness and more developed characters whose pain, suffering, and determination are clearly depicted on their faces. A notable novelty is the inclusion of female characters who are not merely passive objects subjected to violence (such as the demolition and burning of houses, fleeing, and rape). Instead, the artist clearly outlines their strength through their facial expressions, movements, and attitudes.

In the next map of 20 drawings (1940), as many as five from the cycle Mother Heroes depict strong and determined female figures, ready to face the challenges that lie ahead. Even when standing over ruins, they do not cry; when accompanying their men to the front, they walk straight beside them with a determined and confident stride. Interestingly, the same composition of sending off fighters appears in both the map For Freedom and the Mother Heroes cycle. However, in the 1940 drawing, the cap of an International Brigades fighter is replaced by a helmet, given the fact that the Spanish Civil War had already ended by that time. Furthermore, the figures and scenes are simplified, reducing the composition to only the basic motif of a farewell involving three figures: a man carrying a child in his arms and a rifle on his shoulder, and a woman, who, with a bundle, walks in step with her husband and child.

The scene that narratively follows this one is titled Farewell, showing a deeply emotional parting of the same couple. It is worth emphasising that the depiction of a male fighter with a child is very unusual, already indicating the celebration of gender equality that would be gained during and following the Second World War, and immortalised in many of Kun’s post-war works.

Kun also created a cliché for the character of little Juanita based on Dušan Matić’s song Zovem se Anita (My Name is Anita), which students wore on their lapels as a badge, symbolising defiance and defense of the Spanish Republic. Female characters appear on equal footing with male figures in his works, including in the shooting scene from a 1938 sketch of the same title, which shows a clear influence of Goya’s revolutionary and almost archetypal depiction of the shootings of the Third of May 1808. Among the victims is a woman kneeling with her hands above the back of her head, her face vividly expressing pain and horror at what awaits them all, while the attackers are indicated only by the pointed bayonets, drawing a parallel with the sheet from the map Blood-Soaked Gold titled Hoćemo l’ dovek da ginemo (Shall We Forever Die?), which shows the death of the miners and makes a direct connection through motif of suffering.

The scene that follows this one narratively is Parting, which depicts the deeply emotional parting of the same couple. It is important to highlight that the portrayal of a male fighter with a child is quite unusual, already signaling the celebration of gender equality, a value that would become prominent during and after the Second World War, and later immortalised in many of Kun’s post-war works.

Kun also created a model for the character of little Juanita, inspired by Dušan Matić’s poem My Name is Anita, which students wore on their lapels as a badge – a symbol of defiance and defense of the Spanish Republic. Female characters appear equally alongside men in his works, such as in the shooting scene sketch from 1938, visibly influenced by Goya’s revolutionary and almost archetypal painting The Third of May 1808. Among the victims in Kun’s sketch is a woman kneeling, her hands raised behind her head, her face vividly expressing pain and terror over the fate that awaits them. The attackers are represented only by their pointed bayonets, evoking a parallel with a sheet from the Blood-Soaked Gold map titled SHALL WE FOREVER DIE?, which portrays the death of miners and connects the two works through the shared motif of suffering.

We would like to highlight several lesser-known and rarely exhibited original ink drawings created during Kun’s stay in Spain, which are preserved in the collection of the Museum of Yugoslavia. One such drawing, made in black ink and wash on a sheet from an A5 notebook, is titled After the Bombardment of Lerida and dated 1938. It depicts a young man lying dead on the ground, while a woman kneels above him, her arms outstretched in an expression of pain and despair. The scene likely portrays a mother mourning her son.

The drawing belongs to a thematic circle depicting the consequences of fascist terror on innocent civilians, just like another drawing showing a woman dragging a wounded man while walking backwards. We see an even more active role of women in the 1937 drawing Spain, where a woman stands at a lectern, her face expressive and her hands raised as she passionately explains something. Behind her, two sketched flags are placed on the platform.

A similar gesture – a recognisable battle cry – appears in Kun’s post-war posters, such as the one created for the First Anti-Fascist Rally of Serbian Women, held in Belgrade on the 28^th of January 1945. However, in this case, the woman gives a victorious salute, smiling, her hands no longer clenched in spasm, as they are in the drawing Spain, where every vein is strained. The international framework of anti-fascism was later adapted to the Yugoslav context. Kun also imbues his female figures with a strong pacifist message, reflecting the belief that “women have always been pacifists”.

New Era – New Tasks

Yugoslav volunteers in Spain (referred to as “our Spaniards”) enjoyed a great reputation in socialist Yugoslavia. They were regarded as a “moral compass” in society, and this moral capital placed a special responsibility on them, as they represented the most progressive segment of Yugoslav society. As early as 1947, the State Master Workshop of Fine Arts was established, and Đorđe Andrejević Kun, who managed it, was awarded the title of Master Painter, reaffirming his role as an exemplar for new generations of young artists.

The idea behind the establishment of these master workshops came from Antun Augustinčić, who saw them as a “necessary means for training high-quality fine artists. This level of quality can only be achieved through direct contact between the student and the master over many years of work; education at the academy does not ensure the student such a way of working”. According to Augustinčić, “learning in the classroom does not meet the demands of the present, as students cannot fully absorb everything from their professors in such a setting, leading to a decline in art”.  The goal of the master workshops was for associates to gain practical experience through daily communication and collaborative work with the master, under whose direct supervision the most talented students would undergo a form of specialisation, learning from the best. This approach was expected to curb the overproduction of dilettantes graduating from academies where the outdated teaching system left them ill-prepared for independent professional work, thereby clearly distinguishing high school teaching staff from professional artists. However, there was concern that these master workshops might foster unhealthy, “feudal” relationships between master and student, as university professor Đurađ Bošković warned. Criticism mainly focused on the potential for these schools to resemble feudalistic or Soviet-style institutions. Although the Soviet model of state control over artistic life, including the direction and channeling of artistic creativity, could have served as an inspiration for the master workshops, it cannot be said that the Soviet model was fully adopted given that the workshops were established in both the USSR and the FPRY around the same time. Nevertheless, the Yugoslav model remained autonomous, according to the vision of its creator, Antun Augustinčić.

Master workshops of fine arts were established after the Second World War in the Federal People’s Republic of Yugoslavia as independent state institutions, under the leadership of the Committee for Culture and Art of the Government of FPRY. The workshops were designed for postgraduate studies in painting, sculpture, and architecture, led by prominent artists who held the titles of master-painter, master-sculptor, or other relevant fine arts masters, and these masters directly managed the workshops. The master’s primary responsibility was to provide students with the highest level of artistic education and to prepare them for independent artistic work. This included allowing students to exhibit their works alongside their master’s, as well as those of other students admitted to the workshops based on the master’s recommendation. The course of study lasted four years, after which students earned the title of graduate painter or sculptor from the master workshop. In total, there were nine such workshops throughout Yugoslavia, three of which were located in Belgrade.

One of the main challenges was constructing purpose-built master workshops separate from academies to avoid external influence. This required significant funding and loans, as all the masters agreed that work could not commence until the workshops were completed. The buildings were designed in the Greek-Renaissance style, featuring porches and columns. The master workshops for Toma Rosandić and Đorđe Andrejević Kun were built on the same plot in Senjak, as a single-storey building with a construction area of 650 m², that included three large, bright studios for the master and students. Milo Milunović’s workshop was also nearby. Kun regularly visited the construction site and raised numerous objections to the quality of the work, which he found unsound and careless. He also complained about missed construction deadlines.

Kun regularly visited the construction site and raised numerous objections to the quality of the work, which he found unsound and careless. He also complained about missed construction deadlines because on the 1^st of July 1950, he was appointed by the Council for Science and Culture of the Government of the FPRY to manage the State Master Workshop of Fine Arts in Belgrade. The workshop was officially opened on the 26^th of May 1951, at 32 Topčiderski venac (later at 2 Konavljanska Street) and there Kun mentored young painters until 1955, when the workshop was closed and merged with the Academy of Fine Arts as a special department for figural composition and mosaics. Kun returned to the Academy of Fine Arts as a full professor but retained a studio in the former master’s workshop, where he continued to create art for the rest of his life.

Active participation in the construction of the building, as well as the design of furniture and other furnishings for the master’s workshop, should not surprise us, as Kun had already demonstrated his architectural skills during the summer of 1941 when he contributed to the construction of an illegal printing press for the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Yugoslavia. He created the conceptual design of the building, including the layout of an apartment for a small family, a printing room, and a secret entrance hidden within a closet in the bedroom, which he positioned directly above the concealed space that was accessed by pulling out a drawer in the lower part of the closet and lifting a board above the drawer, which served as the bottom of the upper section of the closet. Beneath the drawer was a concrete lid, secured with an iron strut from the lower space. Since hiring an architect for such a conspiratorial task was too risky, a house was built based on Kun’s sketches at Banjički Venac. It was completed in July 1941 and functioned as a secret printing house until August 1943, when it had to be vacated due to the arrival of German officers after the occupation authorities requisitioned the house.

The master workshops were conceived as spaces that, during the post-war period of scarcity, lack of funds, materials, and workspace, would provide opportunities for large state projects that were to be carried out by skilled craftsmen alongside their apprentices, who would, over time, be trained for complex projects and sustain themselves from such projects. However, when authority over the workshops was transferred from the federal to the republic level (as early as 1950), each republic independently determined their fate. Unlike in Croatia, where 321 participants passed through these workshops and some continued operating until the mid-1980s, the workshops in Serbia were short-lived due to high costs and lack of profitability.

In his master workshop, Kun created a large mosaic of glazed ceramic tiles for the Monument of Revolution in Ivanjica, collaborating with Miloš Gvozdenović, Ljubo Lah, and Nada Hude, a project on which he had been working since 1951. The representative monument to fallen soldiers in the National Liberation War was unveiled on the 7^th of July on the occasion of the Uprising Day in 1957. Apart from the mosaic, Kun also authored the architectural design of the monument, which, according to the experts of the Institute for the Protection of Cultural Monuments in Kraljevo, represents the largest open-air monument in the mosaic technique in the Balkans. The mosaic, which forms the central part of the monument, measures 280 x 950 cm and is placed on the upper section of the monument in the form of an inverted trapezoid measuring 360 x 1100 cm, mounted on a flat pedestal made of white marble slabs, standing 140 cm high, with the years 1941–1945 inscribed on it. The central portion of the monument is flanked by two arms, each 4 meters long and 1 meter high, recessed by 60 cm in relation to the central part. The plateau concludes with four low steps. The base of the entire geometrically regular monument, including the steps, is 24 meters wide and slightly concave, forming a landscape unit with a lawn in front and poplars planted behind it, which create a transition to the natural background of the monument – a hill with which it merges through its colour, predominantly gray-greenish tones. The poplar symbolises sturdiness, light, and purity, qualities that can be associated with the struggle against fascism and the fighters who took part in it. Kun suggested the monument’s location in the park along the road to the partisan cemetery and devised the urban planning solution for the area, which even today remains a beautifully arranged and maintained space with benches, forming part of the city centre of Ivanjica. This area is a protected spatial cultural-historical entity, protected as an immovable cultural asset of great importance.

The thematic content of this monument presents the war participants through symbolic representations of heroic triumph and heroic death. Nine figures are depicted – seven men and one woman in a charge – among whom is the ninth figure, a fallen fighter on the brink of death, symbolising those who sacrificed their lives for freedom. There is a noticeable typification in the treatment of the figures, with pronounced muscularity, during moments of action or momentum, conveying the pathos of suffering, alluding to the strength in the fight for a revolutionary idea. Three men and one woman are carrying rifles; one fighter is swinging a bomb; another is firmly holding a red flag with both hands as a symbol of the revolution; and two figures, with raised hands, are calling the people to an uprising.

That Kun had contemplated about this monument for a long time is evident from numerous sketches, about thirty studies and models of the urban design of both the monument and its surroundings, which he exhibited in 1953 at his first post-war solo exhibition in Belgrade, held at the Art Pavilion in Kalemegdan. In addition to the unfinished mosaic, the final sketch for the mosaic was displayed, which fully corresponds to the implemented design – the composition is identical, as well as the arrangement and number of figures, with the only difference being the faces, which were merely sketched in the drawing, but fully elaborated in the mosaic itself.

Even more interesting is another 1950 tempera sketch on paper, created as a frieze and exhibited at the aforementioned exhibition. From this, we see that Kun originally envisioned a much larger composition featuring around forty figures, from which he ultimately selected only the central part for the mosaic, representing the climax of the composition, the uprising itself, which he divides into two equal and “balanced” parts. The right side of the composition consists of the scenes that preceded the uprising – the people’s struggle and resistance, captivity shown through the depiction of people walking with bowed heads and bound hands, and the suffering of workers, peasants, women, and children. On the left, more optimistic scenes depict the reconstruction of a war-torn country through representations of dynamic figures dancing in each other’s arms, workers with wheelbarrows, hammers, and axes, and peasant women with sheaves of corn. These scenes illustrate the inseparability of class struggle from armed resistance to fascism, at the same time celebrating the values of gender equality achieved during the Second World War, reflected in the recurring presence of female figures in Kun’s works. The equality that was sought after became the ideal of the new post-war society through the transformation of power relations and the abolition of class divisions and gender inequality. We notice that the narrative flows from left to right, possibly because Kun was left-handed. Interestingly, he used this motif in the invitation to the opening of the master’s workshop, as if he knew that this would be his largest realised project.

We can say that Kun always repaid his debts by returning to subjects and motifs he had left unfinished, the ones that haunted him for decades and felt as though they had more to express – such as the Bor mines, Spain, and the Second World War. Could this “debt to Ivanjica” have been the reason he created his only monument of his career there, becoming the first painter in Yugoslavia to build a public monument? In 1936, Đorđe, his wife Nada, and their eleven-month-old daughter Mira were vacationing in Ivanjica. As Kun’s colleague from the Život art group, the painter Radojica Živanović Noe, had chosen the same destination for his vacation, the two spent their time actively preparing propaganda material for a pre-election assembly in Ivanjica, supporting progressive, communist-oriented forces. Kun wrote the texts for banners and radio posters, one of which, according to Nada Kun’s recollection, depicted a prison window with bars and a prisoner through it, anticipating what would soon befall him and his comrades. The monument dedicated to the fallen fighters of the National Liberation Struggle was Kun’s idea, which he presented as a member of the city planning commission. The monument was erected by the Municipal Committee of the Ivanjica Fighters’ Association, which covered the costs for the materials and fees for Kun’s collaborators, while Kun donated his artistic contribution to the citizens of Ivanjica.

The mosaic Rachel Weeps for Her Children, a copy of a 14^th-century fresco from St. Mark’s Monastery in Macedonia, was also created in Kun’s studio on Topčidersko Brdo. The mosaic was commissioned by the Cabinet of the President of the Federal People’s Republic of Yugoslavia (FPRY). From the contract concluded on the 22^nd of February 1957, we learn that Đorđe Andrejević Kun, as a contractor, made an offer to create a coloured sketch with dimensions of 280 x 190 cm, based on the reproduction from the magazine Raška, and to make a mosaic of the same dimensions from multi-coloured stone from the Montenegrin coast, provided that the sketch be approved by the commission appointed by the Office of the President of the Republic. It is a gift from Josip Broz Tito and the Yugoslav government for the monument to the Jewish victims of the Second World War. The mosaic was installed on the side wall of the conference hall of the Holocaust Museum in Paris in 1957, and according to the report submitted by Kun upon his return from Paris, “this work appears imposing and impressive, both in terms of its theme and composition, as well as its material. The administration of the monument expressed its liking and considers it the most beautiful gift they received in the form of art contributions.” This Old Testament theme was chosen because Rachel’s mourning for her sons represents the mourning of Jewish mothers whose children were killed. Rachel embodies the pain of all mothers worldwide, in every age, and the tears of every human being who mourns irreparable losses.

At first glance, the choice of a religious theme as a gift from the president of a socialist country can be confusing, but it was the 1950s – a decade that began with the presentation of Yugoslavia in Paris through an exhibition on medieval Yugoslav art (L’Art medieval Yugoslave) in 1950. This exhibition displayed frescoes from monasteries in Serbia and Macedonia, Romanesque stone sculptures and architecture from Croatia, and Bogomil stone tombstones stećaks from Bosnia, with the intent of showcasing, on the one hand, the developed medieval culture and civilisation of the Yugoslav peoples and, on the other, the continuity of their struggle for language equality, national identity, and the search for a unique path from Bogomil art to modern times. The writer of the foreword for the catalogue and one of the exibition’s main organisers, Miroslav Krleža (1893–1981), was a key figure in the reflection and creation of the image of Yugoslav art, which he believed was rooted in the Middle Ages, arguing that Yugoslav socialist art should be autochthonous, based on its own historical sources rather than imported models from the West or East. All of this aligned with the concept of a third way in politics and art, which had its roots in the Middle Ages.

Only eight years later, Yugoslavia presented itself at the Expo 58 World Exhibition in Brussels as a modern state with a specific social and political system, culture, and art that was neither influenced by the East nor the West, but instead was building their own third way. Workers’ self-management was emphasised as a distinctive feature that distinguished Yugoslavia from other socialist countries, positioning it as a democratic state. The narrative that Yugoslavia was unique was constructed through a discourse about a specific Yugoslav identity, modernism inspired by medieval art. Oto Bihalji-Merin, a writer, publicist, art critic, and another influential figure in shaping Yugoslav cultural policy, was responsible for the realm of art as a member of the preparatory committee and later the General Commissariat of the Yugoslav section of the general international exhibition in Brussels. He was also a jury member for the architectural design of the pavilion and member of the Art Council. Svetozar Vukmanović Tempo, a high-ranking party functionary, connoisseur of fine art, and collector of paintings, evaluated the exhibition of Yugoslav art as incomplete. Although the selection of works was respectable, it excluded pieces that did not fit into the modernist discourse. Similarly, Đorđe Andrejević Kun did not fit within that modernist framework either; he did not exhibit at any international exhibitions, where the same artists were repeatedly showcased and Yugoslav art was presented in the form of moderate modernism, which was particularly suitable for representing Yugoslavia precisely due to its ideological neutrality and the sought-after modernity. Hence, this aesthetic perfectly fit into the official system of “socialist aestheticism”, representing Yugoslavia as an open country both domestically and internationally, complemented by autochthonous art represented by the naive art of the Hlebine School of painting. The themes explored by Kun did not align with the strategies of cultural policy, just as folklore did not fit the projected image of a liberalised socialist society because Yugoslavia was considered to be much more than a picturesque and primitive country where folklore represented the highest artistic achievement. He exhibited only twice outside the country: at a group exhibition in Moscow in 1955 and at a solo exhibition in the German Democratic Republic in 1963.

A convinced realist, Kun did not wish to conform if it conflicted with his beliefs:

“It is our duty to fight for the quality of the work because only in this way can we expect our new, realistic art to be worthy of the people’s efforts in the struggle for construction; only in this way will the image of our man – the builder – be artistically outlined. Thus, our art will have all the conditions to be original, true, and great.”

Kun made this statement in 1947, but the fight against formalism preoccupied him many years later. When asked by a journalist whether modernity could be expressed in abstract painting forms, he replied: “I don’t think it can. Just as any other form, definite and finished, cannot be accepted as a prescription. The form is born spontaneously, only through working and experiencing the reality in which the artist lives. We don’t know what that form will be. As for abstract painting (or any other formalism), I think it will disappear. However, our people are healthy and fresh and do not succumb to foreign influences simply because they are foreign. We didn’t survive; we just started living. There were attempts to adopt that influence in our country before, but they were abandoned. We are all searching. What should inspire us in this search is the great revolutionary era that our nation has entered.”

He also sincerely believed that art belongs to the people and that the task of visual artists is to participate in the country’s construction because “not only are new companies being built, not only are new railways being constructed; entire cities are being rebuilt, expanded, and adorned. Our peoples are increasingly expressing the need for beauty in their lives. Large folk homes, cultural centres, and public institutions require paintings, reliefs, and sculptures. The squares of big cities, as well as smaller ones, demand monuments.”

For this reason, he always accepted membership in various commissions and associations, considering it his duty. From 1958 until the end of his life, he was a member of the Evaluation Commission for the construction of the Memorial Park for the October Victims in Kragujevac. That same year, together with Pivo Karamatijević, he opened an exhibition commemorating the anniversary of the Battle of Sutjeska, where he displayed the monumental painting People Taking Care of the Partisans (280 x 850 cm). Immediately after the exhibition, the painting was installed in the Hall of the People’s Board (Kragujevac Municipal Assembly), where it remains today, although now covered by a curtain due to the unpopularity of the subject, which, according to the artist, is “a synthesis of priceless, warm people’s love and concern for the fighters who bring justice, peace, and freedom with weapons.” As previously mentioned, Kun believed it was his duty to repay his debt to the revolution, often revisiting the same motifs across different media. The motif of the people caring for the fighters is familiar from his graphic sheet of the same title, included in the map Partisans. While the composition differs, probably due to the format required by the location of the painting itself, the characters remain the same: a fighter with a rifle drinking from a flask to invigorate himself, a partisan sitting down and taking food from a bag, and a woman carrying bundles of food to the fighters. For Kun, these scenes were vivid memories from various phases of the People’s Liberation Struggle, set in different locations such as Srem, Bosnia, Semberija, Majevica, Jajce, Drvar etc. Different locations, but the same concern of the people for the fighters: providing food, caring for the wounded, sheltering for those in hiding, ensuring safe passage to free territories, and looking after them all the way. The print version of the motif is more compact, with a stronger pyramidal composition, while the oil painting is more descriptive, containing more details and characters (with an equal number of male and female figures), though it is somewhat less powerful, executed in free and broad strokes in predominantly gray-greenish autumn tones.

Creation of New State Symbols

Kun was active in the Propaganda Department of the Supreme Staff of the People’s Liberation Army of Yugoslavia and the partisan detachments of Yugoslavia. Upon arriving in Jajce, he was given a studio in the administration building of the Elektrobosna Carbide Factory, where he worked and lived. According to Kun’s sketch, the factory workers created a press for printing woodcuts and linocuts, as well as tools for woodcuts. The first task Kun received from the Supreme Staff was to decorate the House of Culture, the former Sokol House, where the Second Session of the AVNOJ (Anti-Fascist Council for the National Liberation of Yugoslavia) was held on the 29^th of November 1943. He made large portraits of the presidents of the allied countries – Churchill, Stalin, and Roosevelt – as well as portraits of Lenin, Marx, Engels, and Tito for the side walls of the hall. Antun Augustinčić portrayed Tito and that bust was displayed next to the central lectern when the foundations of the Josip Broz Tito personality cult were created. The aim of Tito’s bust was to visualise the AVNOJ decisions on the ban on returning to the country of King Petar II Karađorđević and to clearly emphasise the personality of Josip Broz as the first president of Yugoslavia. Immediately after the decisions of the Second AVNOJ Session, work began on creating graphic symbols for the new Yugoslavia, intended as a quick and simple channel for conveying a whole range of meanings.

The analysis of state symbols identified similar methods in the creation of state mythology across diametrically opposed ideologies, recognising key myths in every human community: the myth of origin, the struggle against an external enemy as a unifying force for the nation, and the image of the Savior as a leader guiding toward a better future. These elements must be visually represented on state symbols in a clear and legible way for all to understand.

The emblem of socialist Yugoslavia was created through the joint efforts of artists Đorđe Andrejević Kun and Antun Augustinčić in late November 1943, during the Second AVNOJ Session, when the foundations of the new Yugoslav society were laid. The five flaming torches represented the five nations of Yugoslavia, whereas the sixth torch was added in 1963, when the country’s name was changed to the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. The idea of using flaming torches as a symbol of brotherhood among nations was suggested to Kun by Moša Pijade in a letter he sent to him.

In the initial sketches, the new emblem did not include a date but featured the name of the new state, Federative Democratic Yugoslavia, on the strip. This was later replaced by the date of the founding of the Yugoslav republic, representing the myth of origin. The red five-pointed star at the top symbolises the anti-fascist struggle and resistance to the common enemy, whereas the ears of corn and sun’s rays symbolise a brighter future under Tito’s leadership. Tito’s image appeared on the first DFY postage stamp, designed by Đorđe Andrejević Kun, and printed on the 21^st of February 1945. Kun also designed the conceptual solution for the first partisan postage stamp of the new Yugoslavia in April 1944 in Drvar, following a task assigned by the Supreme Staff. The drawing depicts a partisan holding a rifle in one hand and a flag in the other, with a five-pointed star below. The name Yugoslavia is written in Latin script on the upper side and in Cyrillic script on the lower side. The claim that Tito served as a model for the partisan has never been confirmed. Various sources state that Kun hand-printed only twenty copies of this stamp using the woodcut technique. However, the German raid on Drvar (German: Unternehmen Rösselsprung) prevented its release, as the woodcut was destroyed in the house where Kun worked. As far as is known today, only two copies of this rare and valuable stamp have been preserved.

In the same year, Kun received an order from Ivan Milutinović, the Commissioner for the National Economy of the Provisional Yugoslav Government, to create drawings for banknotes, a task he completed in just a few days. Milivoje Rodić posed for a drawing of a partisan with a rifle, representing an anonymous hero and this image served not only as the main motif but also the sole design for all banknote denominations. After the drawings were reviewed and approved by Josip Broz Tito and Ivan Milutinović, they were sent to Moscow, where the first series of banknotes was printed in denominations of 1, 5, 10, 20, 50, 100, 500, and 1000 dinars. These banknotes, marked with “DFJ” [Democratic Federal Yugoslavia] and dated 1944, were put into circulation on the 20^th of April 1945. In this way, the newly formed state sent a clear message to its citizens through a universally accessible channel – its first banknotes, depicting partisans as the foundation of the new state, born from the People’s Liberation Struggle and serving as an integrative factor in unifying the nation through the myth of a common struggle against the external enemy.

Every revolution and nation-building is subject to mythologising and exaggeration. “Myth is a constitutive element of every true revolution. It is a form of collective consciousness and feelings, not a description of things, but an expression of will that transforms the rebellion of hungry mouths into a sublime creative act. If collective goals, beliefs, and aspirations are not shaped into a mythical representation, the scope of revolutionary action is limited, the action is ineffective and non-uniform… Although myth holds little value as a political programme, it has an emphasised practical role.” It is an important part of political ideology, functioning as motivation, incentive, but likewise justification. Turning history into myth is a key feature of national identity. The first and basic aspect of national identity is the historical territory, i.e. the homeland, the cradle of the nation which is “sacred” to its members, which belongs to them as much as they belong to it. Nations are unthinkable without shared myths about a territorial homeland and its memory: the myth of the promised land is just one of a group of political myths, rooted in the domain of religious inspiration. This is what makes the homeland unique, and its natural features gain historical significance for the people, becoming sites of pilgrimage.

After the Second World War, Yugoslavia actively sought to create a unique cultural and historical memory that would unify various national histories (and arts) into a shared identity – Yugoslav identity. In the process of a comprehensive transformation of society and the creation of a “new socialist man”, the state employed the political strategy of “inventing tradition”.  It should not be understood that this phenomenon was unique to the Yugoslav revolution or socialism, as “inventing tradition” occurs in all times and places. However, it tends to be more prevalent during periods of rapid and radical transformations of society, when old social patterns and old traditions need to be replaced with new ones. Yugoslav invented traditions were formalised through constant repetition and transformation into rituals, habits, or even reflexive actions, aimed at strengthening unity among the Yugoslav peoples, as well as through creating a common collective memory based on the mythology of the People’s Liberation Struggle and the Socialist Revolution as unifying factors. Art played a significant role in shaping the ideology of the regime, serving as an “advertising window” of the new post-revolutionary government. It assumed a political role and its task was to celebrate the new society and system, visualise ideology, and function as a kind of biblia pauperum of the new era. Đorđe Andrejević Kun fit perfectly into this framework with his propaganda works from the first post-war years.

In contrast to the cultural policy of interwar Yugoslavia, which was more a set of individual initiatives than a collective cultural state effort, the new government, as early as 1945, laid the foundations of an apparatus for agitation and propaganda, with the aim of  placing the entire political, cultural, educational, and scientific life “directly or indirectly” in the hands of the Party and its propaganda institutions, channeling all cultural aspirations of the population. Through work in the fields of culture and creativity, it was necessary to acquaint the masses with the goals of the Communist Party of Yugoslavia, mobilising them and “pulling them out” from the influence of foreign cultural and ideological forces.

Conclusion

Looking for an answer to the question posed in the title, we tried to explain that Kun remains important to us today as an artist who always courageously went into the trenches, whether they were in the mining pits of the Bor mines, the Spanish Civil War, the basement of an illegal printing press, or in prisons, caves, and forests during the Second World War. His contributions also include efforts to improve the position of artists and workers, and create a new society through designing state symbols, engaging in pedagogical work, and actively participating in artistic associations or public art projects. The topics Kun addressed remain relevant today – environmental issues, the oppression of workers in foreign factories whose owners get rich at their expense, paying them miserable wages without any labour rights or the possibility of organising a trade union, the position of artists in society, even the very space of the Cvijeta Zuzorić Art Pavilion, which in the 1930s was boycotted by artists from the Association of Fine Artists due to high rents. Today, artists are once again fighting for the same space on Kalemegdan, as its property-legal status and the status of the Association of Fine Artists who use the pavilion, have not been resolved. Almost a hundred years later, we returned to the same thing, and that is why Kun is today a symbol of struggle that contemporary artists recognise as inspiration and return to as an important reference in their work. Today, resistance is most often reduced to an intimate act of mental defiance against the unfavourable circumstances in which we find ourselves, and most people, from the comfort of their armchairs, choose to change the TV channel or ignore reality, remaining enclosed in their own little world, offering only silent resistance. We should think of those who, often risking their lives, engaged in public (un)armed resistance, like Kun, and reflect on what we would do in their place. Even when their lives were not directly threatened, and they could have found excuses – such as that it was not their struggle, that it did not concern them, or having a small child at home – they chose to stand up. With their struggle, they preserved human dignity and left a valuable legacy for future generations.