Tag: 1925.

Frane Cota, King Tomislav, 1925

Frane Cota
(1898 – 1951)
King Tomislav, 1925
bronze, casting
368 x 258 mm
MG-2892-768

Frane Cota was a sculptor and architect who graduated from the Academy in Vienna in 1924 and later completed his architectural studies in Zagreb in 1929. He spent brief periods in Prague, Paris, and Italy. From 1934 to 1950, he taught architectural drawing at the Faculty of Engineering in Zagreb, and from 1941, he also served as a drawing professor at the Higher Pedagogical School in Zagreb.
Cota was a prominent figure in Croatian modern art. Although he primarily identified as a sculptor, he was equally successful as an architect, approaching space with a functionalist mindset and a sculptor’s sensitivity to volume. In his early sculptural work, he was influenced by the Viennese Secession and by Ivan Meštrović, but soon evolved toward a modernist form of realism. His body of work includes portraits, nudes, figures, and reliefs. He also created medals and plaques, among which the King Tomislav plaque from 1925 stands out, made to commemorate the 1000th anniversary of the Croatian Kingdom.
The shallow relief of this plaque features an idealized depiction of the legendary Croatian King Tomislav. Seated on a throne and turned to the left, the king is portrayed wearing a crown and a mantle draped over his shoulders. He holds a sceptre in his right hand and a royal orb in his left, resting on the upper edge of a shield bearing the Croatian coat of arms. The plaque has raised edges, and along the wider lower edge the years 925 – 1925 are inscribed.

Text: Tatijana Gareljić, Museum Advisor, National Museum of Modern Art © National Museum of Modern Art, Zagreb
Photo: Goran Vranić © National Museum of Modern Art, Zagreb

Gabriel Jurkić Winter, 1925

Gabriel Jurkić
Winter, 1925
oil on cardboard
32.5 x 89.5 cm
MG-6800

In the snowy idyll Winter from 1925, Gabriel Jurkić depicts the Bosnian plateau blanketed in a deep pristine whiteness, exalting the divine beauty and harmony. Rendered in an elongated horizontal format and a myriad of icy white and bluish hues, the scene exudes a sense of majestic tranquillity and silence. Donated to the NMMU Collection in 2003, this painting is also emblematic of a remarkable series of winter landscapes that Jurkić created during the 1920s, skilfully blending Impressionist techniques with the ornamental flair of Art Nouveau. The Winter cycle, produced at the height of his career, received widespread critical praise, and its popularity with the public is underscored by the sale of over two hundred paintings following the exhibition of the same name in 1922 at the prestigious Salon Ullrich in Zagreb.
Gabriel Jurkić (Livno, BiH, 1886–1974) received his artistic training in Zagreb under Bela Čikoš-Sesija and Menci Clement Crnčić before continuing his studies at the Academy in Vienna, where he trained with Alois Delug and later specialised under Kazimierz Pochwalski. His first major works, created in the spirit of Symbolism and Art Nouveau, include Plateau in Bloom (1914, from the collection of the National Gallery of Bosnia and Herzegovina in Sarajevo) and Path to Eternity (1918, from the NMMU collection). Through his depictions of his homeland as a vision of earthly and celestial harmony, Jurkić established himself as one of the foremost landscape painters of the 20th century. Over a career spanning more than six decades, he painted not only landscapes but also portraits and religious themes. While his early work reflected Impressionist influences, his later style was marked by a more spiritual realism. In addition to painting, he was involved in printmaking, book design and illustration, as well as restoration.

Text: Lada Bošnjak Velagić, museum advisor at the National Museum of Modern Art © National Museum of Modern Art, Zagreb
Translated by: Robertina Tomić
Photo: Goran Vranić © National Museum of Modern Art, Zagreb

Sava Šumanović, A Self-Portrait, 1925

Sava Šumanović
(1896-1942)
A Self-Portrait, 1925
oil on canvas
100x80.6 cm
MG-1964

Thanks to the figure having been placed in the foreground of the composition, Sava Šumanović’s A Self-Portrait painting from 1925 is an example of his approach to Figurative Art. Šumanović balanced the disproportionate relationship between the figure in the foreground and the interior in the background by having graded the view of the sequence of rooms in the depth of the painting. His A Self-Portrait belongs to the “green phase” of his work, which is evident in the grey-blue and green colour palette, which represents a departure from his earlier post-cubist phase.
Sava Šumanović began exhibiting at Croatia’s Spring Salon (1917) already as a student of the College of Arts and Crafts in Zagreb, and had solo exhibitions set up as early as 1918 and 1920. He produced illustrations for the avant-garde magazine Juriš and stage designs for the Croatian National Theatre. Following his first successes in Zagreb, he moved to Paris where he worked at André Lhote’s studio. Upon his return to Zagreb, Šumanović was disappointed with the wider public’s lack of understanding of his art, so in protest he signed his paintings in French. Although Šumanović’s key exhibition of works painted in the style of classicised academic Cubism held in Zagreb in 1921 received good reviews, Šumanović moved back to Paris in 1925. Having gotten mentally ill, in 1930 he moved back to his parents’ home in Šid. He painted a series of cityscape vedutas, children’s portraits, landscapes, and compositions of women bathers and pickers in the spirit of Poetic Realism. He worked diligently until he was executed in World War II in 1942.

Text: Zlatko Tot, curator intern 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