"From the moment a man took up a chisel or a paintbrush to express the world around him, the desire arose in him to place his own image in that world…"
These words open the catalogue of the exhibition Self-Portraits of Sarajevo Painters, held in Zagreb in 1970. The text reminds us that a self-portrait is not merely a depiction of an artist's own face—it is a reflection of the artist's personality, the time in which they lived and worked, and the way they perceived themselves and the world around them.
This very idea inspired the exhibition How They Painted Themselves, organized by the Museum of Sarajevo in 2017, which presented self-portraits of prominent Bosnian and Herzegovinian artists from the Museum's Art Collection.
Today, we present the works of Petar Tiješić, Todor Švrakić, Ismet Mujezinović, Hakija Kulenović and Adele Behr—artists who, each in their own way, left a lasting mark not only on the history of Bosnian and Herzegovinian art, but also through the image they created of themselves.
Alongside the photographs of these self-portraits, we are also sharing the poster for the 1970 exhibition Self-Portraits of Sarajevo Painters, as well as photographs from the opening of the 2017 exhibition How They Painted Themselves, highlighting the continuity of presenting and studying this valuable segment of our artistic heritage.
