Miljenko Stancic About Himself
I am truly, from time to time, overwhelmed by nostalgia for the lost time and place of my childhood, or, better yet, for the blessed ignorance of a child... Does it not seem to you that my panoramas of Varazdin have from the very beginning been panoramas of a lost soul?
I presume that a certain commitment may still fulfill a man's life. It need not do so, but it may. Perhaps such existence becomes more and more difficult to endure, but, on the other hand, it is certain that today, we may discern some traces of continuity in growingly heterogenous opuses. Why ask for justification? Why indeed.
Review Excerpts
"Acknowledged as exceptional and outstanding, he was soon promoted into a 'classic', which provided his painting with the significance of ancient deeds." (V. Malekovic, "Vjesnik", Zagreb, 16 Jan., 1971)
"... Stancic operated as a classic moving easily along the clair-obscure of our petty bourgeois Vermeer interiors. (K. Hegedusic, "Naprijed", Zagreb, 12 Dec., 1952)
"... he is above all the painter of Varazdin (...) Old-fashioned, sad, and even crying nostalgia for his homeland's church-towers was the permanent source of his happiest parochialisms. (M. Krleza, "Miljenko Stancic", Zagreb, 1964)
"Miljenko Stancic, Croatian painter, was devoted to the analysis of his childhood, its signs and simbols (...) It is the same little Miljenko who slept on the raised railroad barrier that went down each time a train was supposed to arrive... We are reminded an Aragon's vision here: "As a blind child's cry on the blind track". Too much literature! Is there any painting left here? By all means - the very best of it." (F. Megret, "Le Figaro litteraire, Paris, 22 Dec., 1969)