ATANAS PATSЕV, 100th Anniversary of the Artist’s Birth 15–27.06.2026

ATANAS PATSЕV

100th Anniversary of the Artist’s Birth

June 15–27, 2026

May 27 marked the 100th anniversary of the birth of Atanas Patsеv (1926–1999). We are pleased to note that several parallel exhibitions are taking place in Sofia to mark the anniversary of this great Bulgarian artist. The events cover various periods and concepts in his oeuvre. The programme includes the following highlights:

• Exhibition “Plastic Weightlessness” at the “Raiko Alexiev” Gallery – Union of Bulgarian Artists. The project focuses entirely on the pivotal “Weightlessness” cycle in his work, first shown in 1968.

• The Sofia City Art Gallery, “Dechko Uzunov” branch, presents the exhibition “Atanas Patsеv. Portraits and Self-Portraits”—an exhibition of the artist’s works created during the 1970s and 1980s, part of the gallery’s collection.

• Arte Gallery presents a small-scale exhibition featuring portraits and landscapes by Atanas Patsеv from private collections. The exhibition covers the period during which the artist’s reception ranged from outright rejection to enthusiastic acclaim (from the 1960s to the 1980s). Some of his most significant achievements are in the field of portraiture (we are showing portraits of girls, self-portraits, and others)—the exhibited paintings are from the 1960s and 1980s, as well as landscapes from Plovdiv, Sozopol, and others—from the 1970s. The exhibition does not claim to be a retrospective, but it offers a representative selection of his work and serves as a reminder of the figures in Bulgarian art who have left a deep mark on contemporary culture.

Atanas Patsov remains in the history of Bulgarian art as an artist who boldly defied the dogmas of his time. A student of Prof. Dechko Uzunov, Patsev quickly abandoned traditional spatial laws to develop his own unique style, marked by expressive distortion and explosive colour.

In 2005, at Arte (then on Rakovska Street), we received a dozen works by Atanas Patsеv from the “Weightlessness” series at a very reasonable price of around 400–600 § per canvas. Alas, tastes were different back then, and no one was interested in such expressive painting—we didn’t sell a single piece. Now, 20 years later, the public reacts quite differently, and Patsov has found his way into many prestigious collections.

After that failure at the start of our venture, Patsеv became exceptionally interesting to me as both an artist and a person. He is one of the artists most devoted to his craft. From 1980 until almost his death, Atanas Patsеv filled 94 notebooks with his diary entries. His words resonate deeply in my mind: “One must approach Art with one’s whole being. All one’s attention, all one’s time, and all one’s strength are necessary, but they are not enough. One must sacrifice one’s life. Life is needed both as a guarantee and as proof to oneself that there is nothing above art, that art is (has become) a destructive and creative force, the only answer to the air you breathe. Whether this creativity is needed by others, whether it has value, meaning, a future—these are meaningless questions.” /Atanas Patsеv, Diaries, October 20, 1981, Notebook No. 7/.

To date, we have organised more than six events related to Atanas Patsеv, including solo exhibitions and video materials in his memory. You can follow all of this on the Arte website (artegallery.eu) and the Arte Gallery YouTube channel. We are proud to be able to engage with the work of this iconic artist, philosopher, and thinker, whose 100th anniversary brings us back to the true values of art.

Gergana Borisova, June 2026