"Davor Džalto has dragged the icon kicking and screaming into the twenty-first century. In a strange harmony of contrasts and contradictions, combining elements of Bacon and Banksie, his images of saints and apostles gaze out across the centuries in a fury of agitated (though restrained) line and colour, to break the confining limits of their frames and stare into our very souls, while at the same time preserving the nonchalance of world weary dons relaxing and conversing through a haze of cigar smoke at high table. Vibrant primary hues from a restricted palette, applied alternately in thick impasto and limpid washes, enlivened by bold strokes of black and white, give his colours an edge only associated in the modern world with primeaval danger of seas of opposing soccer hooligans. Nature, red in tooth and claw, and nailed on the cloister wall. No meaningless label here, these are truly contemporary εἰκώνες forged from a fusion of eastern Byzantine tradition with western pop culture: a timely reminder of the continuing vibrancy of religious art in the modern world."
Paul Gwynne, Division Chair of Arts and Humanities
"The (divine) light-infused icon-like paintings of Davor Džalto shine a light on the eternal and always central questions of tradition and modern (re)interpretations in Christian and particularly Orthodox Christian art. Therefore, the sensory effects produced by the form, color and light of the icon-like paintings of Davor Džalto are conductive to the complex and essential crucible of the phenomenon which we, in modern times, have defined as religious art."
Jelena Erdeljan, Professor of Art History
