Kauzlarić Atač Zlatko – Rebecca in the Pool

He was born in 1945 in Koprivnica. After finishing high school, he enrolled in the Academy of Fine Arts in Zagreb. During his studies, he became involved in the work of the Student Experimental Theatre. He graduated in the class of Prof. Miljenko Stančić and immediately became a collaborator in Professor K. Hegedušić’s master workshop. In 1973, he became an assistant at the Academy of Fine Arts in Zagreb, where he still works as a full professor and was dean for a period. In addition to painting and graphics, he has been intensively involved in scenography and costume design, collaborating on about a hundred theatre projects both domestically and internationally, as well as several film and television projects. He is also the author of several visual interventions in public spaces. In 1996, a monograph about him was published, authored by Tonko Maroević. He is the recipient of many awards for painting and scenography and was awarded the Order of Danica for cultural merits. Atac’s existence in the field of painting is marked by works—the first created during his involvement with the group “Biafra” (from 1970), portraits of famous people in expressive movement, nudes, and numerous self-nudes. From the very beginning, the author has inherited a sense of expression of the moment, rhythm, movement, and characteristic artistic engagement. His current painting preoccupation is nudes immersed in water, where drawing is replaced by the dominance of pure painterly treatment of the surface with color, revealing all the virtuosity of a master who does not suppress expression with figurative expression.