Meе?troviд? Ivan (Mestrovic Ivan)

(1883-1962)
Born August 15, 1883 in Vrople, in a peasant family. Up to 18 years was a shepherd and in his spare time engaged in wood carving, decorating household items. His talent was noticed, and the boy was sent to training to the marble carvers in Split. In 1901-1904 Meе?troviд? studied architecture at the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna, and then began to exhibit his work, including exhibitions of the Viennese Secession, has traveled, worked mainly in Paris and Rome. Among the best works Meе?troviд? - architectural and sculptural decoration of the burial chapel of the family in the village of Cavtat Raд?iд? near Ragusa (1923, . Dubrovnik), . monument Griguru Ninskomu in Split (1926-1927) and a monument to the Unknown Hero on Mount Avala, near Belgrade (1934-1938),
. Exhibitions of his work in America were organized in the Brooklyn Museum (1924) and in the Metropolitan Museum of Art (1947). In 1945 he emigrated, from 1947 lived in the United States, he taught sculpture at the universities of Syracuse and Notre Dame. In 1952, the sculptor gave his home in Split, with all remain in the works Yugoslav Republic. Died Meе?troviд? in South Bend (pc. Indiana, USA) January 16, 1962.
For style characterized Meе?troviд? tense posture in the spirit of Michelangelo, the archaic forms of simplification, the linear attention to detail and rough texture of the surface. Art Meе?troviд? is farther from the modernist than distorted or abstract forms of the works of many of his contemporaries, but it is often somewhat pretentious, despite the strength of the sculptor of talent and an abundance of wonderful decorative motifs.