Tarik Berber’s work offers a remarkable combination of two very different cultural worlds. He is of Bosniac origin. That is to say, he comes from the Muslim population of the always-contested territory of Bosnia, once part of the former Yugoslavia and now independent. Bosnia has a notably rich and complex cultural tradition and Tarik is a descendant of a celebrated family of artists. As a working artist, he still maintains close ties with the milieu from which he originates.
He trained, however, at the celebrated Florentine Academy, which offers perhaps the most rigorous of all trainings for painters. They grind their own colours, mix their own paints and make their own brushes, just as the apprentices did in the studios of the great Renaissance masters.
This profound respect for tradition shows itself very clearly in Berber’s work. His paintings, with their muted colours, often have the appearance of frescos. They also demonstrate a keen interest in classical principles of design – in the relationship of the form to the edges of the space within which they have been placed.