Soldiers and a Peasant

1937
ink/paper
320 x 415 mm
signature: down in the right corner: M. Virius / 1937

Soldiers stopped a peasant on his way back home from work in fields. Clear, sharp lines with village in a background.

Mirko Virius was born on October 28 1889 in Djelekovec, a village near Koprivnica. He was part of the progressive peasant movement. He connected with painters from Hlebine, Ivan Generalic and Franjo Mraz - they are the founders of Croatian naive art. He participated in the first exhibition of peasant painters in Zagreb. He painted with watercolors, oil paintings and he made drawings. Themes of his works are social: the work in the countryside, home and life rural poverty. Due to political activity he was arrested and taken to a concentration camp in Zemun where he died in 1943.