Biography
Ljiljana Kolešnik (1959–2026) graduated in Art History and Comparative Literature from the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, University of Zagreb. She earned a master’s degree in Museology from the Faculty of Organization and Informatics in Varaždin. In 2000, she obtained her PhD in Art History from the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, University of Zagreb, with a thesis titled “Croatian Art Criticism and Croatian Visual Art in the 1950s”, supervised by Prof Radovan Ivančević.
At the Institute of Art History, she led several long-term scientific and competitive research projects: “Modernity, Modernism, and Postmodernism in 20th-Century Croatian Art“ (2007–2011); “The Parisian Art Scene and Croatian Modern Art” (2013–2015); “Modern and Contemporary Art Networks, Art Groups, and Associations: Organizational and Communicational Models of Collaborative Art Practices in the 20th and 21st Centuries” (ARTNET, 2015–2018); and “Models and Practices of Global and Cultural Exchange and the Non-Aligned Movement” (Glob_exchange, 2020–2023). As of June 2025, she was a member of the ERC project “Housing.Yu – The Right to Housing: Production of Everyday Living Spaces in Yugoslavia (1945–1991)”, led by Dr Tamara Bjažić Klarin.
Her professional and scholarly interests include modern art of the second half of the 20th century (sculpture, painting, and art criticism); art, visual culture, and cultural policy in Central and Eastern Europe during the 1950s and 1960s; critical artistic and curatorial practices from the late 1960s to the late 1980s; post-war utopian architecture/urbanism and issues concerning the democratization of urban space; contemporary theory of the visual arts.
She was a member of the editorial boards for the journals Informatica Museologica (MDC, Zagreb) and Annali Galerije Antuna Augustinčića (Antun Augustinčić Gallery, Klanjec).
She has been an active member of several international professional associations, including EAM (European Network for Avant-Garde and Modernism Studies), ASEEES (Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies), SHERA (The Society of Historians of East European, Eurasian, and Russian Art and Architecture), and HS-AICA (Croatian Section of the International Association of Art Critics).
She has worked as a lecturer and external collaborator at the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, University of Split (graduate and doctoral programs), the Humanities doctoral program at the University of Zadar, and undergraduate Art History programs at the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences in Zagreb and the University of Sarajevo.
In 2010, she initiated the establishment of the Regional Center for Art, Culture, and New Media at the Institute of Art History in Zagreb.
For her editorial work on the book “Socialism and Modernity: Art, Culture, and Politics 1950–1974” she received the “Radovan Ivančević” Annual Award of the Croatian Society of Art Historians for 2012.
From 2014 to 2016 she served as a member of the Parliamentary Committee for Ethics in Science and Higher Education of the Republic of Croatia. In January 2025, as retired Senior Research Adviser in tenure, she was appointed as emerita at the Institute of Art History in Zagreb.
Bibliography (selected)
Books
Ljiljana Kolešnik, Sanja Horvatinčić (ur.), Modern and Contemporary Artists' Networks. An Inquiry into Digital History of Art and Architecture, Institut za povijest umjetnosti, Zagreb, 2018.
Ljiljana Kolešnik, Petar Prelog (ur.), Moderna umjetnost u Hrvatskoj 1898.–1975., Institut za povijest umjetnosti, Zagreb, 2012.
Ljiljana Kolešnik (ur. / ed.), Socialism and Modernity. Art, Culture, politics 1950–1974, Museum of Contemporary Art – Institite of Art History, Zagreb, 2012. (hrvatsko i englesko izdanje / croatian and english edition)
Irena Kraševac, Petar Prelog, Ljiljana Kolešnik, Akademija likovnih umjetnosti u Münchenu i hrvatsko slikarstvo / Die Akademie der Bildenden Künste in München und die kroatische Malerei, Institut za povijest umjetnosti, Zagreb, 2008., 160 str.
Ljiljana Kolešnik (ur. / ed.), Između istoka i zapada. Hrvatska umjetnost i likovna kritika 1950-ih, Institut za povijest umjetnosti, Zagreb, 2006.
Ljiljana Kolešnik (ur. / ed.), Umjetničko djelo kao društvena činjenica. Perspektive kritičke povijesti umjetnosti, Institut za povijest umjetnosti, Zagreb, 2006.
Ljiljana Kolešnik (ur. / ed.), Art and Ideology. The Nineteen-fifties in a divided Europe, conference proceedings, Zagreb, 2004.
Ljiljana Kolešnik (ur. / ed.), Antologija hrvatske likovne kritike 50ih godina // Croatian Art Criticism of the 1950’s. An Antology, Društvo povjesničara umjetnosti, Zagreb, 1999.
Ljiljana Kolešnik (ur./ed.), Feministička likovna kritika i teorija likovnih umjetnosti // Feminist Art Criticism and Feminist Theory of Art, Centar za ženske studije (Centre for Women's Studies), Zagreb, 2000.
Radoslav Putar – kritičar i kroničar 1950.–1960. / Radoslav Putar – Art Critic and Art Cronicher (1950.–1960.), Institut za povijest umjetnosti, Zagreb, 1998.
Scholarly papers
Digitalna povijest umjetnosti – obilježja, problemi i perspektive / Digital Art History – Features, Problems and Prospects, u: Život umjetnosti, 99, 2016., Zagreb, 1-10.
Ljiljana Kolešnik, Artur Šilić, Nikola Bojić, Rekonstrukcija osobne mreže Almira Mavigniera i njezina relacija prema prvoj izložbi Novih tendencija. Primjer primjene mrežne analize i mrežnih vizualizacija u povijesti umjetnosti /Reconstruction of Almir Mavignier’s Personal Network and its Relation to the First New Tendencies Exhibition. The example of the Application of Network Analysis and Network Visualisation in Art History, u: Život umjetnosti, 99, 2016., Zagreb, 58-79.
Zagreb as the location of International Art Movement New Tendencies (1961–1973), in: Jérôme Bazin, Pascal Dubourg Glatigny, Piotr Piotrowski (eds.), Art beyond Borders. Artistic Exchange in Communist Europe (1945–1989), Budapest, CEU Press, 2016, 311-323.
Novija povijest povijesti umjetnosti u Hrvatskoj i suvremena kriza institucija /The Recent History of Art History in Croatia and the Crisis of Institutions Today, u: Život umjetnosti, 93, 2013., Zagreb, 4-19.
Potreba revizije dominantne slike povijesti europske moderne umjetnosti i prijedlog „horizontalne povijesti umjetnosti“ Piotra Piotrowskog, u: Andrej Žmegač (ur.), Zbornik 3. kongresa hrvatskih povjesničara umjetnosti, Institut za povijest umjetnosti, Zagreb, 2012., 301-306.
Croatian Secession: The Unsuccessful Quest for Modernity at the Edge of the Empire, in: Centropa 3/X, New York, January 2011, 146-163, ISSN 1532-5563.
Decade of freedom, hopes and illusions. Yugoslav society of 1960's a framework of New Tendencies rational utopia, in: Radovi instituta za povijest umjetnosti, Zagreb, 34, 2010., 221-224 (summary).
Između tradicije i dekonstrukcije. Problemi suvremenih spomenika žrtvama holokausta, in: Anali galerije Antuna Augustinčića, XXVI/26, Klanjec, 2007., 87-110 (summary).
Utjecaj kulturalnih teorija na povijest umjetnosti kao znanstvenu disciplinu, u: Zbornik 1. kongresa hrvatskih povjesničara umjetnosti, Milan Pelc (ur.), Institut za povijest umjetnosti, Zagreb, 2004.
Dangerous Liaisons: The Relation between Art and Socialist State – Croatian Experience of the 1950s, in: Vojtech Lahoda, (ed.), Local Strategies. International Ambitions. Modern Art and Central Europe 1918-1968 /Praha: Artefactum, 2006., 213-223.
From Sunday Painters to Professionals. Croatian Women Artists at the Turn of the 20th Century, in: Art studies quarterly, 3-4 2002, 15-22.
Autoportreti Naste Rojc: primjer oblikovanja predodžbe seksualiziranog ženskog subjekta u hrvatskoj umjetnosti ranog modernizma // Self-portraits by Nasta Rojc: Producing the Image of Sexualized Women Subject in the Croatian Early Modern Art, in: Radovi Instituta za povijest umjetnosti, 24, 2000., 187-204 (summary).
Hrvatska spomenička skulptura u kontekstu europskog modernizma druge polovice 20. stoljeća: primjer V. Bakića // Croatian Monumental Sculpture and European High Modernism: Example of V. Bakić, in: Radovi Instituta za povijest umjetnosti, 22, 1998., 186-201 (summary).
Postoji li feministička povijest umjetnosti? // Is there a Feminist Art History?, in: Treća. Časopis Centra za ženske studije, 1/I, 1998., 109-113 (summary).
Nedovršeni Meštrovićev spomenik Jozefu Pilsudskom u Varšavi // Ivan Meštrović’s Unfinished Monument to Jozef Pilsudski in Warsaw, in: Radovi Instituta za povijest umjetnosti, 19, 1995., 133-134 (summary).
Fenomen ženske umjetnosti u hrvatskoj umjetnosti devedesetih // Women’s Art Phenomenon and Croatian Art Scene in the 1990’s, in: Kolo, 2/3, 1993., 38-45.