Smrekar was born in Ljubljana, the capitol city of Slovenian lands and part of Austria-Hungary. After World War I, the multi-ethnic state dissolved and two thirds of Slovenian territory, after a thousand years under Central-European German polities, became part of a Slavic Balkan kingdom of Yugoslavia. Northern lands stayed with Austria and the Littoral region went to Italy. Huge assimilation pressures in Fascist Italy and pre-Nazi Austria, centralized rule from Belgrade that after 1929 became openly dictatorial, economic crisis and general disappointment over the new reality fed Smrekar’s critical art.

In Vienna, he and other Slovenian artist formed Vesna art club, which gleaned its iconography from Slovenian traditions and national motifs. The group also looked to pan-Slavic Russian, Czech and Polish artists. Members of Vesna were younger contemporaries of Slovenian Impressionists and like them were influenced by Vienna and Munich Secession, especially by magazines Ver Sacrum and Jugend. They merged decorative style with visual storytelling and folk art. Smrekar also paid close attention to even the most mundane aspects of everyday life, from the newspapers’ crime section to price increases and child benefits.

Smrekar’s speciality were ink drawings – washed, watercoloured, combined with pastel and graphic prints – woodcuts, etchings, aquatints. Besides print, he also pioneered caricature, which until then was present only in folk art. He drew inspiration from international satirical newspapers, like Meggendorfer Blätter, Simplicissimus, Die Muskete, Neue Glühlichter, and Kikeriki!

After 1919, Smrekar faced severe mental illness and years-long insomnia. He spent months in resorts and psychiatric hospitals, drawing harrowing images of different types of psychiatric patients. Seeing distortions everywhere, he turned his later subjects into stock characters and ghouls.

Smrekar often mocked authority and used humour as a weapon. He barely escaped punishment in 1914 for insulting the Austrian Kaiser Franz Jospeh I. He was then arrested and imprisoned in 1915 for mocking German soldiers. Later, he was subjected to frivolous lawsuits that he answered in sarcastic tones. In 1942, when Ljubljana was occupied by Mussolini’s Italy, he was arrested for possession of a Resistance newspaper and executed the next day without trial. Smrekar’s demise was in some ways inevitable. Despite his anti-Fascist stand, it is likely that he would not have escaped the Communist purges at the end of the War.