Artist of the Day, April 29, 2026 : Ivan Meštrović, a Croatian sculptor, architect, and writer (#2513)

 Ivan Meštrović (1883 – 1962) was a Croatian sculptor, architect, and writer. He was the most prominent modern Croatian sculptor and a leading artistic personality in contemporary Zagreb. He studied at Pavao 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 (he advocated the creation of art of national features inspired by the heroic folk songs). 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.

Most of his early works of symbolic themes were formed in the spirit of the Secession, some of which, like the Well of Life, show impressionist restless surfaces created under the influence of Rodin's naturalism, and the second, reviving national myth, become stylized monumental plastics. Before the First World War, he left pathetic epic stylization, expressing increasingly emotional states, as evidenced by the wooden reliefs of biblical themes made in a combination of Archaic, Gothic, Secessionist and Expressionist styles. During the 1920s and 1930s, the classical component prevailed in his works. In this period, he created a number of public monuments of strong plastic expression, pronounced and legible shapes.

Meštrović achieved works of strong plastic value in the construction-sculptural monuments and projects, mostly with central layout. He also designed a memorial church of King Zvonimir in Biskupija near Knin inspired by old Croatian churches, a representative family palace, today the Ivan Meštrović Gallery, and reconstructed renaissance fortified mansion Crikvine-Kaštilac in Split. 

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 Ivan Meštrović

Well of Life, c.1905

Miloš Obilić, c.1908

Widow, c.1908

Portrait of Marko Nakić, c.1910

Sphinx, c.1911

Christ on the Cross, c.1913

The Apparition, c.1913

St. John the Baptist, c.1914

Annunciation, c.1915

St. Luke the Evangelist, c.1915

Domagoj's Archers, c.1917

Madonna and Child, c.1917

Woman at Prayer, c.1917

Girl Playing a Mandolin, c.1918

Girl with a Lute, c.1918

King Petar I. Karadjordjevic, c.1920s

Portrait of King Alexander I Karađorđević, c.1922

Bust of Josip Juraj Strossmayer, c.1923-24

Contemplation, c.1924

Portrait of Milica Banać The Muse, c.1925

Seated Girl, c.1925

Study of an Angel, c.1925

Girl with harp, c.1927

In Despair, c.1927

Pensive Woman, c.1927

Psyche, c.1927

Girl with a Lute, c.1927-28

The Bowman and the Spearman, c.1928

Gregory of Nin, c.1929

History of the Croats, c.1932

History of the Croats, c.1932