Zagreb, the City of Female Artists / Zagabria, la città delle artiste

CIVICO MUSEO REVOLTELLA

Galleria d’Arte Moderna

Trieste, Italy

October 1, 2021 – December 12, 2021

The Art Pavilion in Zagreb is collaborating for the first time with the Civico Museo Revoltella, Galleria d’Arte Moderna by presenting the exhibition Zagreb, the City of Female Artists in Trieste. The exhibition was held at the Art Pavilion last year from early February until the earthquake on March 22. This is the first large, group presentation of croatian female artists in Italy.

About exhibition:

The city of Zagreb has always been a place where cultures and arts intertwine, and yet we are often in danger of forgetting the many women artists who have made their mark on the cultural and artistic live that Zagreb lives today. In order to recall those Croatian female artists who were pioneers, as one might say, in art and yet are mostly remembered only on paper, and to bring them together with contemporary women artists, the Art Pavilion in Zagreb has decided to devote one exhibition precisely to these Croatian female artists. They are, of course, important not only for Zagreb but also for the whole of the Croatian art scene.

Zagreb, City of Female Artists is the first exhibition since the Republic of Croatia achieved independence to provide an overview, taking in a large span of time (from 1899 to 2019), of the works of Croatian women artists who are in some way or other connected with Zagreb. Some of them are linked to the city by birth, residence, the creation and exhibition of their work, some of them were born in other cities and came to live in Zagreb, to produce their works in it. And there are those who came to Zagreb to study at the Academy of Fine Arts and then stayed, to live, work and exhibit. There are also those born in the city who graduated from the Academy of Fine Arts and worked for a bit in Zagreb but were taken by their paths in life and art to other cities, to other countries. The exhibition has taken in 48 women artists and their works, selected by the authors of the expert conception, three outstanding women art historians, Ljerka Dulibić, Ivana Mance and Radmila Iva Janković.

The basic idea of the exhibition is to provide a historical and critical cross section of the oeuvres of women visual artists who have worked in Zagreb and left a trace on the cultural life of the city within the timeline covered by the exhibition. Within this relatively broad span of time, the generations of women artists are presented in three major units. The first covers those who were active up to World War II; the second the generations that started their exhibition activity after World War II and accomplished the major part of their oeuvres in the decades to come. Finally, the third group contains those generations that appeared on the scene in the early seventies and later, and are mostly still at work today.

The exhibition includes 64 works in all the media of expression in the visual arts: from classic painting and sculpting to contemporary ways of artistic expression, audio and video installations starting with works by Anka Bestall, Slava Raškaj, Lina Crnčić Virant, Nasta Rojc, Mila Wod, Sonja Kovačić-Tajčević, Anka Krizmanić, Vera Nikolić Podrinske, Zdenka Ostović Pexidr Srića, Nevenka Đorđević, Ivana Tomljenović Meller, Ksenija Kantoci, Marta Ehrlich, Mila Kumbatović, Melita Bošnjak, Miranda Morić, Milena Lah, Vera Josipović, Vesna Sokolić, Borka Avramove, Vera Dajht Kralj, Tonka Petrić, Biserka Baretić, Marija Ujević, Goranka Vrus Murtić, Nives Kavurić Kurtović, Zdenka Pozaić, Marijana Muljević, Sanja Iveković, Jadranka Fatur, Nevenka Arbanas, Vesna Popržan, Breda Beban, Nina Ivančić, Zvjezdana Fio, Dubravka Rakoci, Vlasta Delimar, Vesna Pokas, Kata Mijatović, Amela Frankl, Ksenija Turčić, Mirjana Vodopija, Vlasta Žanić, Kristina Leko, Božena Končić Badurina, Magdalena Pederin, Ana Hušman and Andreja Kulunčić with the Collective ISTE.