The Sculpture Collection at MSU contains almost 1000 artworks, chronologically extending back into the first half of the 20th century.
Since its foundation, the Museum has been actively involved in innovative artistic developments, through both its exhibition programmes and its acquisition strategy.
In this respect, the Collection of Sculpture reveals a certain tendency towards experimentation with respect to the three-dimensional form and the expanding notion of sculpture, which now includes objects, multiples, ready-mades, assemblages, ambiences, and installations.
The Collection's speciality is work by artists who participated in the exhibitions of New Tendencies in the 1960s and the early 1970s, organized by the Contemporary Art Gallery (today's MSU) in Zagreb, from 1961-1973. These international art exhibitions and symposia experimented with the new technological media, including various forms of programmed, kinetic, and lumino-kinetic art, while the last exhibition of New Tendencies was dedicated to computer art and visual research. New Tendencies included some of our most famous artists, such as Vojin Bakić, Vladimir Bonačić, Julije Knifer, Vlado Kristl, Ivan Kožarić, Ivan Picelj, Vjenceslav Richter, Aleksandar Srnec, Ljerka Šibenik, and Miroslav Šutej. The collection has been complemented with works by international artists that exhibited in Zagreb: Mark Adrian, Getulio Alviani, Alberto Biasi, Dadamaino, Edoardo Landi, Julio Le Parc, Bruno Munari, Soto, and Vasarely.
Work of Ivan Kožarić, one of our most important sculptors of the second half of the 20th century, was systematically followed by his early and Gorgonian works, and the collection possesses his anthology works. Also in the collection are the works of Dimitrije Bašićević Mangelosa and Josip Vaništa, also members of the Gorgona group.
The New Artistic Practice in the late 60s and 70s promoted conceptual and ambiental art, as well as primary and analytical sculpture, which investigated the procedure of creating a sculptural object, including new working processes, materials, and contexts (Ladislav Galeta, Vladimir Gudac, Tomislav Gotovac, Josip Pepija Stošić).
In the late 70s and 80s, numerous works of art were created by young artists for whom installations and objects made in the manner of post-conceptualism and post-modernism were the dominant mode of expression (Slavomir Drinković, Branko Lepen, Vlado Marteka, Ante Rašić, Damir Sokić, Mladen Stilinović, Edita Schubert).
The Collection also possesses some of the seminal installations created in the 90s and the early 21st century, such as those by Goran Petercol, Gorki Žuvela, Vesna Pokas, Petar Barišić, Ines Krasić, Ksenija Turčić, Mirjana Vodopija, Vlasta Žanić, Alem Korkut while international names include Chen Zhen and Jimmie Durham.
In 2007, the Museum accepted the donation made by Duba Sambolec, whose 15 works of art, mostly sculptural installations created between 1993 and 2005, refer to states of war as symptoms of current social processes.
Contact:
Collection manager: Natasa Ivančević, museum advisor natasa.ivancevic@msu.hr
