Oto’s youth in Zemun and Berlin deeply shaped his leftist and anti-fascist ideas, exposing him to avant-garde artistic movements such as Expressionism, Dada and New Objectivity. In 1928, with his brother Pavle Bihali, he co-founded the left-wing publishing house Nolit and the magazine Nova Literatura (New Literature). After spending time in Spain and Paris, Oto settled in Zürich in 1934, where he wrote for Die Neue Weltbühne, Die Deutsche Blätter, and Savremeni Pogledi, and associated with artists and writers such as Max Beckmann, Max Bill, Wolfgang Langhoff, Stefan Zweig and Albert Einstein. In the late 1930s he was closely involved with the landmark exhibition Twentieth Century German Art, shown in London in 1938, and (under the pseudonym Peter Thoene) wrote the companion volume, Modern German Art, the first publication on this subject in English.
After WW2, Oto Bihalji-Merin wrote extensively about the works of naïve artists. His most famous book, The World of Naïve Artists (1959), is considered to be a foundational text on the subject. He was involved in publishing and editing cultural magazines and books which played a crucial role in shaping the intellectual landscape of Yugoslavia in the mid 20th century.
This talk by its curators Senka Latinovic and Miroslav Karic, introduced by London-based art historian Alexandra Lazar, coincides with a major exhibition entitled Oto Bihalji-Merin: I Had to Be Present at the Museum of Naive and Marginal Art and the Museum of Contemporary Art in Belgrade. The exhibition celebrates the 120th anniversary of Bihalji-Merin’s birth and runs until 17 February.
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Image: Portrait of Oto Bihalji-Merin, Photo: Tošo Dabac, Archive of the Salon Oto Bihalji-Merin