You can view the exhibition free of charge during the Zagreb Museum Weekend (4 -7/9/2025). Find out more about Zagreb Museum Weekend on the event’s web page: MUV
Find out more about Klovićevi dvori’s programme HERE
About the exhibition:
The collection of artworks by the painter, graphic artist and restorer Josip Restek includes 410 works of art – drawings, watercolors, individual graphic sheets, graphic portfolios and oils. The collection was donated to the City of Zagreb in 2006 by the artist’s widow, Mrs. Blanka Restek, and has been kept at the Klovićevi dvori Gallery ever since. Josip Restek was born on March 7, 1915, in Volavje near Jastrebarsko, and on the occasion of the 110th anniversary of his birth, we are presenting a selection of prints from the aforementioned donation. Josip Restek dedicated three graphic art portfolios to our capital city Zagreb – portfolio from 1949 containing eight lithographic sheets, portfolio from 1965 containing eight colored woodcuts and portfolio from 1986 containing eight linocuts, which you can view in chronological order at this exhibition. The graphics from the 1965 portfolio were printed by students of the School of Applied Arts and Design in Zagreb, and 212 copies of each sheet were printed.
About Josip Restek :
Josip Restek was born on March 7, 1915, in Volavje near Jastrebarsko. In 1936, he enrolled at the Academy of Fine Arts in Zagreb and studied under professors Ljubo Babić, Omer Mujadžić and Tomislav Krizman. In 1940, he graduated in painting, and a year later he completed his studies in art history at the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences in Zagreb. After completing a special course in graphics under professor Tomislav Krizman in 1941, he began to work more intensively on graphic design for books. In 1948, he became a senior restorer at the Restoration Institute of the Yugoslav Academy of Sciences and Arts. From 1950 to 1973, he worked at the School of Applied Arts in Zagreb, initially teaching painting techniques and later at the graphics department. From the 1950s onward, he regularly exhibited at group and solo exhibitions. From 1973 until his retirement in 1982, he worked as a professor at the Higher School of Graphics in Zagreb and for teaching purposes, published the textbook „Fundamentals of Graphic Design“ (1975) and „Tabular Overview of Visual and Graphic Culture“ (1976). He died in Zagreb on 13 May 1987.
Exhibition curators: Valentina Bach, Danijela Markotić, Katarina Srdarev Škorić
Visual identity: Sanja Bachrach Krištofić
Photographs: Goran Vranić
