Old Masters from the Collections of the Museum of Arts and Crafts, Zagreb

The Museum of Arts and Crafts of Zagreb, Croatia, was founded in 1880 on the initiative of the Art Society and its president of the time, Izidor Kršnjavi. The strategy of the Museum’s activities was focused on the preservation of traditional showpieces of folk crafts and on encouragement and development of middle-class culture of that period. In 1882, a school of crafts was adjoined to the Museum, the present-day School of Applied Arts and Design. From its beginnings until today, the Museum’s basic tasks, among other duties, include art education of the public and protection of cultural heritage.

The Museum of Arts and Crafts’ premises – one of the key identity buildings of the Lower Town of Zagreb – are currently closed to the public due to damage caused by the 2020 earthquake. While the reconstruction of the Museum building is in progress, a new installation of the permanent exhibition is being prepared in accordance with the requirements of contemporary museological standards. The museum exhibition activity continues busily, only it is oriented to guest appearances in venues elsewhere. The exhibition Old Masters from the Collections of the Museum of Arts and Crafts, Zagreb. Paintings, Sculptures and Prints at the National Gallery of Slovenia in Ljubljana is the result of the long-standing cooperation between the two museum institutions.

The selected artworks presented at the exhibition emphasize and confirm the diversity of the technical term Old Masters, revealing the wealth and the complex process of formation of art collections of the Museum of Arts and Crafts. Works by famous authors, their workshops or followers are presented within the time span from the second half of 14th to the 18th century. The Painting Collection of the Museum of Arts and Crafts is presented by a selection of nineteen works by representative Italian and northern Old Masters and their workshops, such as Andrea Schiavone, Jan Victors, Leandro Bassano, Francesco Cairo, or followers of Paolo Veneziano, Guido Reni and Balthasar van den Bossche.

The selection from the Sculpture Collection points to the masters who were important mainly for the subalpine tradition of wooden polychrome sculpture. Their works originally made up parts of the equipment of altar wholes in sacred buildings in South Tyrol, Upper Austria, Bavaria, Styria and Croatia and point out the achievements of artistic production under the patronage of ecclesiastical clients in the milieu that valued most highly the established fine art patterns, tradition and graphic models, and very often also kept to strictly codified iconographic formulas. Fifteen exhibits from the Sculpture Collection of the Museum of Arts and Crafts from the period between the 15^th and the end of the 18^th century showcase the production of Old Masters  such as the Styrian master Hans von Judenburg, the Bavarian master Hans Degler, and particularly the notable Styrian Baroque masters, e.g. Veit Königer of Graz, Joseph Holzinger with his workshop in Maribor, and Ferdinand Gallo, active in Celje, as well as works specifically significant for the Zagreb milieu by the sculptors Johannes Komersteiner, Claudius Kautz and Joseph Stallmayer.

The Print Collection of the Museum of Arts and Crafts can be ranked among the most prestigious treasure troves of the graphic production of the European cultural sphere. At this exhibition, works by Croatian, Italian, French, Dutch and German artists are presented. The selected prints show differences in graphic techniques, handling and artistic interpretation of certain themes in the southern, i.e. Italian, graphic production versus the northern one. It is not essential whether printmakers engraved their own inventions or whether their works served as models for further engraving process. The Print Collection of the Museum of Arts and Crafts is presented by eleven prominent works by Old Masters; they date from the period between the 16^th and the end of the 18^thcentury. The selection includes graphic translations of works by Julije Klović/Giulio Clovio, Michelangelo Buonarroti and Peter Paul Rubens as well as original etchings by Jacques Callot, Giuseppe Vasi and other notable printmakers who make up a unique panorama of outstanding achievements of European graphic arts.

Authors of the exhibition
Antonia Došen, Jasmina Fučkan, Marijana Paula Ferenčić

Coordination
Mateja Breščak, Marijana Paula Ferenčić

Conservation-restoration works for the exhibition
Ksenija Pintar, Jasminka Podgorski, Museum of Arts and Crafts, Zagreb
Pavao Lerotić, Croatian Conservation Institute
Jelena Piasevoli Mikac, Velimir Mikac, Martina Petriček, KUSTODA d. o. o.

Exhibition set-up and design
Bojan Lazarević, Agora Proars

The project was supported by