Slavomir Drinković
(1951-2016)
A Knot – a marble sculpture study, 1989-1992
bronze, steel
MG-6298

Slavomir Drinković graduated in sculpture from the Academy of Fine Arts in 1977 (mentored by Prof. Valerije Michieli), after which he specialised in monumental sculpture with sculptors Antun Augustinčić and Ivan Sabolić. In 1989, he also started doing design, architecture and stage design. He was a professor at the Academy of Fine Arts in Zagreb from 1995, and from 2006 to 2010 its dean.
Drinković was a sculptor who placed most emphasis on the strength of material, structure and the elementariness of the process of sculpting, which enabled him to make simple structures into monumental sculptures while using a reduced formal language. Many of his sculptures are mounted in public places and fitted in with their surroundings as a new urban sign, such as his Ab Ovo monument in Osijek. Resembling a cross, a bird in flight carved into a crack of black marble is one of the most impressive monuments to the victims of Croatia’s Homeland War.
Drinković’s refined craftsmanship is reflected in his propensity to maximally purify the surface of his sculptures by polishing them to a high gloss, or to make his torqued columns – such as his A Knot sculpture – as symmetrical as possible. The truncated column of his A Knot is a fragment of endless entanglement. In essence, the sculpture represents a braided rope and is reminiscent of a string of female attributes.

Text:Tatijana Gareljić, museum consultant of the National Museum of Modern Art © National Museum of Modern Art, Zagreb
Translated by: Ana Janković
Photo: Goran Vranić © National Museum of Modern Art, Zagreb