Homo Illustrator

The exhibition of the illustrator Dávid Ursiny on the West Terrace of the Bratislava Castle presents a cross-selection of his book illustrations.

Bhagavad Gita (The Song of God) work, representing the most important Hindu literature and its influence on the development of Indian thinking and literature, is crucial for his work and defining for the author’s direction.

At the exhibition, the largest space is occupied by a selection of illustrations from the book of Indian stories Miracle Jug – Indian fairy tales, which the author translated and illustrated. An illustration of a woman smelling a flower can also be found on the poster for the exhibition.

The selection of exhibited works represents a wide range of topics offered by Indian literature – imagination, philosophy, spirituality, mythology. Illustrations from the book Tree of Life – Fairy tales of the great Amazon are a direct source of fantasy due to their mythological richness. The exhibition also publishes a selection of illustrations of the Bible by Dávid Ursiny from 2003-2007. Ursina in them, as in everything, turns to the whole civilization spiritual tradition.

An interesting part of his illustrations is the storytelling and its traditions in other cultures. Ursina also illustrated the book by Samuel Reuss Stories of Old Slovaks, whose original text was written in German by collecting Slavic storytelling. Reuss was a generation older than Pavol Dobšinský, and in the territory he collected folk tales earlier. An interesting collaboration is also the book Stories from Sumhuram, the publication of which was initiated and collected by the Slovak diplomat Emírke Khidayer.

Picturally, Dávid Ursiny found inspiration in all possible art-historical periods, but especially in those in which often anonymous people touched on reality and imagination with a large dose of small experience. Ursiny is fascinated by this initial experience with (sur)real, inexplicable, or symbolically still undefined visuality. Ursiny is fascinated by this as something original, primordial, close to nature, primordial experience.

You can get more familiar with the author’s work and the motives for its creation on the commented presentations with Dávid Ursiny on 9 and 27 March at 5 p.m., where the author will talk about the creation of illustrations. The exhibition and commented presentations are free of charge.