Exhibition "Jovan Kratochvil: Composition 100/24"

The exhibition 'JOVAN KRATOCHVIL - COMPOSITION 100/24'

The National Museum of Serbia November 15, 2024 - January 26, 2025

The retrospective exhibition of Jovan Kratochvil (1924-1998) is organized on the centenary of the artist's birth and after a sufficient passage of time since his absence, in order to comprehensively review this rich and diverse artistic opus for the first time.

The National Museum of Serbia opens the exhibition on Friday, November 15 at 18:00, believing that only through the exhibition can there be a true opportunity for direct encounter, experience, understanding, reexamination, summarization, and possible repositioning of Jovan Kratochvil's artistic legacy.

The exhibition setup Jovan Kratochvil - Composition 100/24 unites his most significant works from all creative phases, created between the 1940s and 1980s. Starting from partisan art and socialist realism, moving towards abstract expression within the framework of socialist aesthetics and modernism, exploring work in different materials, to groundbreaking achievements in sculptures made of transparent polyester.

The exhibition curator, Lidija Ham Milovanovic, curator of the Collection of Yugoslav Sculpture at the National Museum of Serbia, has selected a total of 100 exhibits, with sculptures being dominant. Also presented are Kratochvil's paintings, graphics, and drawings, along with documentary exhibits on public monuments. Considering that Jovan Kratochvil often referred to his works as Compositions followed by a sequential number in the year of creation, the exhibition layout is named in continuation of the artist's practice.

The selected material is mostly owned by the Kratochvil family, and in addition to works from the National Museum of Serbia, the exhibition includes works from the Museum of Contemporary Art in Belgrade, the Museum of Yugoslavia, the Faculty of Fine Arts, the National Museum of Sumadija in Kragujevac, the Contemporary Gallery from Zrenjanin, the Zepter Museum, as well as three works in private ownership. The selection of exhibits includes Kratochvil's emblematic works, as well as a selection of achievements that have marked his creative phases from the beginning to works that we believe represent both the latest and most inventive outcomes of his artistic quest.