The following lines introduce a new work by the internationally active painter, philosopher and geometrist Uljan Benoni. This somewhat enigmatic artist has been living and working in Prague since 1994 and when asked about his professional background, he smiles and replies that his teacher was Leonardo da Vinci. Already in the 1980s he developed the rules of elliptical perspective and in 1991 he created Patterns of Evolution of Visual Art. He draws and paints both in the traditional way and according to his own method, which he has presented in numerous exhibitions, for example in Geneva or last year in Paris. In 2011 he painted a portrait of Queen Elizabeth in elliptical perspective, which is now in the collections of Buckingham Palace.
Together with his wife Veronika Benoni, also a successful painter (see main photo), ran a gallery under the Castle in Prague for many years and founded the Benoni School for talented adepts, which operates along the lines of the art workshops of the Renaissance. Between 2001 and 2009, 24 exhibitions were held in their gallery.
Art is a science
The publication reviewed in the following lines saw the light of day a short time ago under the somewhat complicated, puzzle-like title E = ART² or "the laws of evolution" (BUbook Publishing, Prague, 2025). It is intended primarily for art historians and teachers of painting, or art reviewers. However, it will also be enjoyed by artists themselves, who think about their work, seek new ways and do not create only intuitively within the framework of their talent. Unless, of course, they are proponents of the traditional idea that art, creativity, is something unpredictable, inexplicable and spontaneous; that there are no laws and rules in this area of human activity and that there cannot be.
Uljan Benoni, on the other hand, tries to prove with his new work that art fits into the same strict framework of development as any other science. Hence the external similarity of the book's title to Einstein's famous formula. E in this formula is a symbol for evolution. Since the evolution of mankind is primarily reflected in culture, the author believes that art can be considered the highest expression of culture. E = ART² Thus, we should understand that art doubly reflects the development of the human spirit. The sign of degree indicates a belonging to the scientific language of mathematics, and as it were includes the fine arts among the exact sciences.
One can disagree or argue with this author's idea, but Benoni's interpretation of the alternating stages in the development of visual art in particular does not lack logic. The author emphasizes the change in human perception of space. The work therefore presents an analysis of the ways of depicting space on the plane from cave drawings to the present day.
A wide range of fifteen chapters
The rich content of the book develops logically from antiquity, when the author delves into the thinking of our ancestors and records the abstract beginning of the emergence of art. Through further chapters on the awareness of space, and one's place in it, Benoni explores the conventions of perceiving and representing reality in the plane, taking the role of the canons of the Church in the visual arts to task in subsequent passages, and emphasizing the importance of the so-called inverted perspective. He also introduces the reader to the term spatial drawing, explains what it is "dimension" a "conventions of three-dimensional space".
From the sixth chapter onwards comes the frequent. the birth of new demands for visual art, there is room for the emergence of Impressionism and the Renaissance, and the author goes into an analysis of the differences and an explanation of the concept of linear thinking.
From the eighth chapter onwards, the theoretical work of visual art presented graduates. The reader is introduced to the concept of the panorama and the history of panoramic representations, including the characteristics of panoramic compositions, as well as the principle of the new tasks facing printmakers and painters. And we come to the geometry of two-dimensional space, including a passage on Advertising and us.
The beauty of the book...
...include the author's stops at history of the search for a new, elliptical perspectives, themes of elliptical depictions i The mystery of the present. The highlight of the content of the presented publication, richly illustrated with examples of drawings, graphic design and technical drawings by Uljan Benoni, is the fifteenth chapter, introducing the specifics of the Sphere as a possible way of artistic representation of the surrounding world. The apparent message of his reflections is that, using any perspective, one sees the world from a certain point, which is the centre of one's awareness of space, or the point where information about what one sees converges and is processed. According to the author, it is legitimate to call this point "Me". So if we assume that "Me I am the centre of the world I see", - then you get the formula for a three-dimensional perspective. This is a new approach, a new philosophy of space awareness, which opens up previously unsuspected possibilities. There are interesting examples of this in the book-
In the conclusion, Benoni mentions the problems brought about by our over-technologized twenty-first century with new artistic means, including digital creation, working with computers or tasks given to so-called artificial intelligence. That is to say, in times when the old truth that landscape painters are mostly recruited from painters who can't handle the figure has long since expired. At a time when visual artists are not trying to impress the public with honest artistry and perfect craft, but also with ugliness, perversion and shock in an attempt to differentiate themselves and draw attention to themselves within the framework of the saying that the end justifies the means and even bad advertising is good advertising.
A few words from the afterword
A book on the laws of the evolution of the visual arts is not intended to shorten leisure moments and requires from its reader both a certain education in the named field and thoughtfulness with which to approach the publication. It undoubtedly belongs in the personal library of people interested in the visual arts, including gallery owners. But also to the artists themselves. To reiterate, one could certainly argue with many of the arguments in the book, but that is not the job of a reviewer who is supposed to draw the reader's attention to an interesting novelty that still smells of printer's ink.
But the only thing that cannot be agreed with are the lines in the book's preface, illuminating the author's intention, what he wants to say with his work. We quote:
"Seeking artists today are turning to new forms of creativity and expressing themselves in design, architecture and computer graphics..." as far as Ulyan Benoni is concerned. It is worse with the last sentence, a highly questionable statement, which says that: "It is thanks to this endless pursuit of perfection that we are all living more comfortably, conveniently and beautifully than before."
gnews.cz - Ivan Černý
Photo - artist's archive
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