Milenko Matanovic
Visual Artist
Bio: Milenko is a Slovenian-born artist and community organizer. As a teenager, he and friends formed an artistic collective in the late 1960s that experimented with land art and installations. In the Pacific Northwest, he was the founding director of the Pomegranate Center. Today he continues to paint with watercolors and ink, and he is the author of the book The Case for Everyday Democracy: Turning Community Meetings into Engines for Collaboration.
On throughlines: “I had a very short but fiery burst of artistic life in Slovenia: very avant-garde conceptual/land art that made the group OHO that I worked with pretty famous. It still is considered one of the more important artistic groups in Eastern Europe.” From sticks against a stone wall, to string through a wheat field, to candles on a field to correspond to stars in the sky-- “I’ve always been fascinated with making connections.”
On international acclaim: Recognizing the group’s pioneering importance in linking art and nature, the OHO group’s early work was exhibited at the 2017 Biennale of Venice.
On community spaces: Milenko and the Pomegranate Center team led the creation of over 60 parks and gathering places, from Neah Bay, Washington, to Tuscaloosa, Alabama. “The Pomegranate Method” is an approach designed to quickly and efficiently tap into the collective wisdom of diverse populations.
On creative habit: “I started drawing when I was 5 years old, and have maintained that practice all my life. As my life became busier with family and work, I learned to squeeze these small creations into available time. I work with pencils, watercolors, ink and simple sculptures. I work very quickly, trusting that the first line will lead to another. These works are my way of keeping my mind, eye, and hands working together.”
On getting unstuck: “I think about the next step and usually I get a direction.”
On the way: “I feel an affinity with Taoism. The goal is to live by doing nothing that goes against nature. The Tao—the way of life—never does anything, yet through it all things get done.”
Favorite place near Issaquah: Issaquah Creek at Confluence Park
Find Milenko:
