An Artist’s Portrait – Lazar Licenoski

Lazar Licenoski was one of the first Macedonian expressionist painters and one of the most authentic painters of landscape, in which he imported folk elements as well. He painted nature, portraits and mosaics.

Ličenoski graduated in 1927 from an art school in Belgrade, where he had studied under Milan Milovanović. Upon graduation, he organized his first exhibition in Skopje and specialized in wall painting at the School of Applied Arts in Paris.

A Monastery on a Shore, 1935

In 1929 he returned to Belgrade and became a member of the group Oblik. He founded the Office of Cultural, an art gallery and an art school where he taught until his death.

Field of Poppies, 1947

His style had developed in the context of the Ecole de Paris. From 1928 up to 1941, his art featured full color expressionism with a high presence of Macedonian motives on his canvases. He moved to Skopje in 1945 and became a professor at the newly established School of Applied Arts.