29.01.2014.
A treasure trove of art
"Odbrana" Media Centre, building in the city centre, has become an unavoidable point in the cultural map of Belgrade. Figures about visits to the gallery of the Club in 2013 confirm this – 40.002 visitors, 17 organized five highly acclaimed exhibitions.Over the past year, the Great and the Small Gallery of Serbian Armed Forces Central Military Club hosted a variety of displays from Novi Sad, Svilajnac, Jagodina, Novi Pazar ... Themes came in a sequence – the First World War and the Balkan wars, the life of heroines and fighters, exhibitions of drawings, photographs and paintings from various collections.
The display that was the most interesting to the visitors was "Memories of a cartoonist", an exhibition of drawings, pastels and illustrations by Momo Kapor, organized in March on the occasion of the third anniversary of death of our distinguished painter and writer. The concept of the exhibition consisted of 70 drawings and 30 pastels that are privately owned by friends, collectors and art lovers of Kapor's drawings. These are portraits of famous historical figures such as Patriarch Pavle, Vuk Karadzic,Tin Ujevic, Branko Copic ... The exhibition, which is a collaborative effort between the "Momcilo Momo Kapor" endowment and the "Odbrana" Media Centre, was seen by 8,198 visitors in more than a month.Also in March, in the Small Gallery, an exhibition "Nadezda Petrovic: on both sides of the lens" by Jasna Jovanov, director of the "Pavle Beljanski" Memorial Collection was opened as a result of her many-year research work. The display presented Nadezda's photographic oeuvre, and during the exhibition, professional interpretations, lectures, screenings of documentaries and children's workshops were organized. The exhibition was visited by 6,185 admirers of the character and the work of the famous Nadezda Petrovic in the period from 15 March to 13 April.
The display entitled "Hundred works from the collection of Djuro Popovic" included the works of Konstantin Danilo, Djuro Jaksic, Steva Todorovic, Uros Predic and other artists. In the Atrium of the Club, a just restored masterpiece by Duro Jaksic "Beheading of Saint John the Baptist" from the 1855 was exposed. The display, which according to experts ranks among the top of the modern Serbian and Yugoslav art by its quality, was seen by 4,940 curious visitors during May and June. This also included fans of the Night of Museums, on 18 May. For all the visitors of the last year's walk through history, the Central Military Club opened the doors of the ceremonial halls and showed the permanent display from its collection. The next, highly attended exhibition was "La Grande Iza by Vlaho Bukovac". The display was mainly focused on the picture "La Grande Iza", although one segment was dedicated to its creator Vlaho Bukovac and the other to Alexis Bouvier, author of the novel who inspired the painter to paint Iza. The exhibition featured also the painting "Gipsy with tambourine" by the same author from the collection of the Central Military Club, and rich illustrative material, published along with the novel by Bouvier. In almost two months, September and October, 6,577 visitors enjoyed a taste of Paris given by presentation of original material, photos of the author, newspaper clippings and articles from the music room of the first owner, in which the image was exposed.
The display "Milunka Savic – Heroine of the Great War" attracted in just two weeks more than 4,000 admirers of her character and deeds. It encompassed reproductions of Milunkina's family, personal and wartime photographs, many of which have never been presented before. Visitors have seen an extensive archives – copies of the documents, the reconstructions of the flags of the Second Iron Regiment under which Milunka fought and uniforms of officers and soldiers of the Serbian Army in that period. The exhibition displayed, for the first time, the honours of the Serbian warrior owned by her family. The exhibition was completed by the portrait of Milunka Savic by the painter Sinisa Labus, Serbian, a gift by Society of the Serbian Hosts to the Historical Museum of Serbia. The exhibition was just one of the events commemorating the 40th anniversary of the death of the great heroine."Odbrana" Media Centre organized during last year a number of book promotions, film screenings, as well as concerts, exhibitions, workshops and lectures, which were also very much visited.
VISITS TO TOWNS ACROSS SERBIA
A representative exhibition of works from the art collection of the Central Military Club, "Poetics and Fate of 20th Century" visited three cities in Serbia. Visitors of the Museum of Naïve and Marginal Art in Jagodina, in April, had a rare opportunity to see in one place works of the great painters of the Yugoslav postwar fine arts, as well as in the Town Museum of Vršac, in April and May, and in the Modern Gallery of the Cultural Centre of Lazarevac, during May and June.The exhibition presented a selection of paintings from the rich collection of the Central Military Club, by art historian Nikola Kusovac and Milorad Bubanja, the former director of the Gallery of the Central Military Club. The exhibition consists of 46 works by some forty authors - Sava Šumanovic, Jovan Bijelic, Ljuba Ivanovic, Petar Lubarda, Ljubo Babic, Vlaho Bukovac, Marko Celebonovic, and other eminent artists from the former Yugoslavia.
