KOVACICA (AP) – Nearly a century ago, two farmers in an ethnic Slovak village in northern Serbia started painting to pass the time during the long winter months.
Recently, their art is being inscribed on the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization’s (UNESCO) intangible cultural heritage list.
The farmers’ paintings and those of others from the village of Kovacica are what is known as naïve art – a form that depicts everyday scenes, landscapes, village life and farm surroundings with a childlike simplicity.
With their bright colours and folk motives, the self-taught naïve painters of Kovacica, about 50 kilometres northeast of Belgrade, Serbia’s capital, have developed a unique tradition among the country’s ethnic Slovak minority. “Naïve art in Kovacica began in 1939 when Martin Paluska and Jan Sokol started painting,” explained head of the Gallery of Naïve Art in the village Ana Zolnaj Barca. “They were farmers with only four grades of elementary school.”
Paluska and Sokol initially painted scenes they saw on postcards, such as Venetian gondolas or wild animals, explained Zolnaj Barca. But their art really bloomed over time, when they turned to their own surroundings rather than far-away lands, she said.
The village’s naïve art gallery, established in 1955, now holds the works of nearly 50 recognised artists and hosts some 20,000 visitors each year.
Among its most famous artists is Zuzana Chalupova, who often painted children and whose work was featured on millions of United Nation Children’s Fund (UNICEF) postcards.
Another Kovacica artist, Martin Jonas, depicted farmers with oversized hands and feet but small heads – meant to symbolise their hard-working life.
And though the Kovacica style of naïve paintings originated in the village, it has since spread far beyond the area.
“An identifying factor, the practice is a means of transmitting the cultural heritage and history of the Slovak community in Serbia,” UNESCO said in its citation.
Serbia’s government said recently that the UNESCO decision to inscribe Kovacica’s naïve paintings confirms the Balkan nation’s “promotion of cultural diversity”.
For gallerist and expert Pavel Babka, naïve art represents a treasure chest of traditional ways and customs – he points to a painting in his gallery showing a girl in traditional Slovak multi-layered skirt being sent off out, alone for the first time.
Another painting in Babka’s gallery features a horse-drawn cart and a yellow house dating back to Austro-Hungarian times, testifying of the long presence of the ethnic Slovak community in what is today Serbia.
Contemporary naïve artists, Babka said, often also seek inspiration in the tales of the past and “would rather paint a horse than a tractor”.
Artist Stefan Varga, 65, agrees. He said he paints images based on the “stories my grandmother told me from when she was a little girl”.
Those times weren’t easy but they were “simple and beautiful”, he said.
Varga’s paintings feature cheerful, red-cheeked villagers in traditional clothes, bright colours, farm animals and huge pumpkins. The main characteristics of naïve painting are “joy and purity, the purity of heart and colours”, he said.
“Naïve painters usually use simple colours,” said Varga. They “use the simplest way to say what they want to say so everybody can understand them, whether they are Chinese, Japanese, English or Serb”. – Jovana Gec
PARIS (AP) – From before sunrise to after sunset, in slippery winters and scorching summers, the roof restorers of Paris toil away, replacing the zinc sheets that help define the city’s famous skyline.
A special spotlight is now shining on their little-noticed skills: the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) inscribed the zinc roof restoration techniques on its list of Intangible Cultural Heritage recently.
“The restoration of a roof involves removing the old pieces of zinc, measuring and custom-cutting new pieces using a Parisian folding machine, and assembling and fixing the pieces onto the roof,” UNESCO said in its citation.
“With nearly 80 per cent of the roofs in Paris covered in zinc, the city is a living archive of these skills that shape the unique identity of its urban landscape.”
Most of the roofers are men, most are young. They often like heights, architecture, and working outdoors.
Fantine Dekens, 21, is a climber who wanted a profession that took her outside and high up. She has been working as a roofer since 2021.
“There is a sort of romanticism around the roofs of Paris that attracted me,” she told the Associated Press (AP).
“It’s super to be outdoors. But there is a physical reality that you can’t ignore. It’s often very cold, or very hot, the things to carry are heavy,” she said. “You can’t do this trade eternally.”
Roofers are hoping the UNESCO recognition will inspire others to join their ranks and improve their working conditions.
The profession is short of workers with the specialised skills for preserving the zinc roofs that have been a distinctive feature of Paris since the 19th Century Haussmann era, from balconied apartment buildings along tree-lined avenues to historic churches that dot the French capital.
“It’s a recognition for our trade, but for me, it’s only useful if it is accompanied by a reflection on why there are so few roofers,” she said.
Using welding techniques from the 1800s, they measure each new sheet of zinc so it fits the shape of the roof just right. Then they mount the often slippery roofs to affix the sheets to their new home.
“There’s a very poetic side when you’re up high,” she said. “I feel very free in my movements. We take naps during our breaks. Often we sing, we shout. No one is watching us. And we can observe all of Paris at the same time. It’s pretty incredible.” – Louise Delmotte
