Kosta Angeli Radovani
Portrait of Vuk Gozze, 1946
bronze
37 × 22 × 18 cm
MG-1456

Kosta Angeli Radovani (1916–2002) was educated at the Brera Academy in Milan and was a professor of sculpture at art academies in Zagreb and Sarajevo. He was a central figure of moderate modernism in the post-war period who developed a figurative language marked by stylisation, volumetric reduction and a gradual shift away from descriptive realism toward structural simplification.
This early post-war portrait marks Angeli Radovani’s transition from academic realism toward a more condensed and structurally simplified treatment of form. Depicting jurist and public figure Vuk Gozze, the bust concentrates on stability and intellectual composure, signalling a departure from strict Socialist Realist conventions. Created during a period when public figures were being incorporated into the symbolic framework of the new state, the bust represents an acceptance of reduction and volumetric clarity.
Text: Marta Radman, curator at the National Museum of Modern Art, Zagreb

Translated by: Marta Radman
Photo: Goran Vranić © National Museum of Modern Art, Zagreb