Ivan Meštrović was a Croatian and Yugoslav sculptor, architect, and writer. He was the most prominent modern Croatian sculptor and a leading artistic personality in contemporary Zagreb. He studied at Pavle Bilinić's Stone Workshop in Split and at the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna, where he was formed under the influence of the Secession. He traveled throughout Europe and studied the works of ancient and Renaissance masters, especially Michelangelo, and French sculptors Auguste Rodin, Antoine Bourdelle and Aristide Maillol. He was the initiator of the national-romantic group Medulić. During the First World War, he lived in emigration. After the war, he returned to Croatia and began a long and fruitful period of sculpture and pedagogical work. In 1942 he emigrated to Italy, in 1943 to Switzerland and in 1947 to the United States. He was a professor of sculpture at the Syracuse University and from 1955 at the University of Notre Dame in South Bend, Indiana.
The Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts is the national academy of Croatia.
The Meštrović Pavilion, also known as the Home of Croatian Artists and colloquially as the Mosque, is a cultural venue and the official seat of the Croatian Society of Fine Artists (HDLU) located on the Square of the Victims of Fascism in central Zagreb, Croatia. Designed by Ivan Meštrović and built in 1938, it has served several functions in its lifetime. An art gallery before World War II, it was converted into a mosque under the Independent State of Croatia and was subsequently transformed into the Museum of the Revolution in post-war Yugoslavia. In 1990, it was given back to the Croatian Association of Artists. After extensive renovation, it has served as a space for exhibitions and events since 2006.
Dimitrije Popović is an eminent Montenegrin and Croatian painter, sculptor, art critic and philosopher born in Cetinje, Montenegro. He attended elementary and high school in his hometown and graduated from the Academy of Fine Arts in Zagreb in 1976 in the class of professor Šime Perić.
Croatian art of the 20th century, that is visual arts within the boundaries of today's Croatia, can be divided into modern art up to the Second World War, and contemporary art afterwards.
Miroslav Kraljević was a Croatian painter, printmaker and sculptor, active in the early part of the 20th century. He is one of the founders of modern art in Croatia.
The Marinko Sudac Collection, based in Zagreb, Croatia, has been created with a clear collecting strategy based on the region of Central and Eastern Europe, additionally spanning from the Baltic area to the Black Sea. The guiding principle of the Collection is systematic exploration, researching, and promotion of the avant-garde practices which have been marginalized, forbidden, and at times completely negated due to the historical, social and political circumstances. In this context, the Marinko Sudac Collection gives the most complete and comprehensive overview on the art of this region. The Collection starts at 1909, and it show the continuity from the first Avant-Gardes, through neo-avant-garde and New Artistic Practices, ending with the fall of the Berlin Wall. The global uniqueness of the Marinko Sudac Collection is also seen in the kind of media it contains. It contains not only traditional artworks, such as paintings, sculptures, and photographs, but it gives equal importance to documentary and archival material. Great importance is put on these almost forgotten media, which enable research of specific phenomena, artists and the socio-political situation which affected this type of art. The Collection contains a great number of museological units, and it treats the documentary and archival material on the same level as traditional artworks. By examining the units contained in the Marinko Sudac Collection, one can read not only the art scene or the art production of a certain artist, but the full status of the society, the socio-political atmosphere of the region in which this art was created in.
The Strossmayer Gallery of Old Masters is a fine art museum in Zagreb, Croatia exhibiting the collection donated to the city by Bishop Josip Juraj Strossmayer in 1884. Located at 11 Nikola Šubić Zrinski Square, it forms part of the Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts.
The Museum of Contemporary Art is a contemporary art museum located on Dubrovnik Avenue in Zagreb, Croatia. It is the biggest and most modern museum in the country. Vesna Meštrić is current director of MSU, replacing Zdenka Badovinac in late 2023 first temporarily and as of 2024 officially.
Josip Račić was a Croatian painter in the early 20th century. Although he died very young, and his work was mostly created during his student years, he is one of the best known modern Croatian painters. Today, Račić is regarded as one of the most important representatives of Croatian modern painting.
Vladimir Becić (1886–1954) was a Croatian painter, best known for his early work in Munich, which had a strong influence on the direction of modern art in Croatia.
The Museum of Fine Arts, is an art museum in Split, Croatia containing works from the 14th century up to the present day providing an overview of the artistic developments in the local art scene. The museum was founded in 1931, and has a permanent exhibition of paintings and sculptures that includes works by major Croatian artists such as Vlaho Bukovac, Mato Celestin Medović, Branislav Dešković, Ivan Meštrović, Emanuel Vidović and Ignjat Job. The museum also has an extensive collection of icons, and holds special exhibits of works by contemporary artists.
The Filip Trade Collection is a large private collection of contemporary Croatian art. The collection is a subsidiary of Filip Trade, a distribution company with its offices located in the capital city of Croatia, Zagreb. The offices and collection are currently undergoing a move and will soon be relocated in a purpose built venue in the Črnomerec district of Zagreb, Croatia. The collection was founded in the nineties with the acquisition of the Drystone Walls graphic by artist Oton Gliha, an acquisition suggested by the Croatian art critic and connoisseur Radovan Beck. Nowadays, the collection holds works of Croatian artists created from the 1950s, up to today. The earliest piece in the collection dates back to 1949 and is the bronze sculpture Bara with a Chicken by the Croatian sculptor Ivan Kožarić.
Ivan Kožarić was a Croatian artist who worked primarily with sculpture but also in a wide variety of media, including permanent and temporary sculptures, assemblages, proclamations, photographs, paintings, and installations. He lived and worked in Zagreb, Croatia.
Ljubomir Tito Stjepan Babić was a Croatian artist, museum curator and literary critic. As an artist, he worked in a variety of media including oils, tempera, watercolour, drawing, etching, and lithography. He was one of the most influential figures in the Zagreb art scene between the two world wars.
The Croatian Museum of Naïve Art is a fine art museum in Zagreb, Croatia dedicated to the work of naïve artists of the 20th century. The museum holdings consist of over 1,900 works of art - paintings, sculptures, drawings and prints, mainly by Croatians but also by other well-known international artists in the genre.
Zlatko Šulentić was a Croatian painter of landscapes and portraits.
Ivo Kerdić (1881–1953) was a Croatian sculptor, best known for his metalwork and medallions.
Slavko Kopač was a French painter, sculptor and poet.
Leo (Leopold) Junek was a Croatian–French painter. He was a founding member of the Group Zemlja, one of the most influential movements in the history of Croatian art. He studied at the Zagreb Academy of Fine Arts, and subsequently moved to France, where he spent the rest of his life and was known as Lorris Junec. He is remembered for his sharp, geometric, colourful landscapes inspired by Post-Impressionism, Cubism, Fauvism, and Dada.
