The Museum of Contemporary Art of Montenegro announces the opening of an exhibition by one of the most prominent contemporary artists from the former Yugoslavia – Mirsad Begić. The exhibition will open on Thursday, May 15 at 8 p.m. at the Gallery of the Museum of Contemporary Art of Montenegro. The exhibition is curated by Milena Durutović.

Titled “Revived Records”, the exhibition offers Montenegrin audiences a chance to engage with the layered, intellectual, and visually complex oeuvre of Mirsad Begić – an artist who has, for more than four decades, shaped one of the most distinctive visual languages in the region.

Although recognized primarily as a sculptor, Begić is an artist whose expression transcends the boundaries of any single medium. His art is multimedia, philosophical, and introspective; in it, sculpture, painting, drawing, and object merge and transform one another. Every trace in his work bears the imprint of a thought process – not shaped so much to depict, as to evoke an inner movement within the viewer.

His work may be understood as a “visual ontology” – art that does not assert meaning, but quietly evokes it, not through narrative or symbolism, but through texture, material, pigment, line, and emptiness.

“In a time of noise, speed, and semiotic oversaturation, Begić’s art offers silence – not the absence of meaning, but its deepest form,” states the exhibition catalogue.

The exhibition features works created across various periods of the artist’s career, including paintings, drawings, sculptures, and objects, through which the continuity of his philosophical and artistic thought can be traced. A special segment is dedicated to his contribution to contemporary sacred art, particularly his design of the side doors of the Cathedral of St. Nicholas in Ljubljana – a work that stands out for its silence, formal asceticism, and spiritual presence.

Mirsad Begić (b. 1953) was born in Glamoč and has lived and worked in Ljubljana since 1983. He studied sculpture at the Academy of Fine Arts in Ljubljana and continued his training at the renowned St. Martin’s School of Art in London. He is the recipient of numerous awards, including the Prešeren Fund Award and the Order of Exceptional Merits of the Republic of Slovenia. In 2011, he was declared an honorary citizen of Ljubljana.

The exhibition is the result of collaboration with the Novak Gallery from Ljubljana, which has for years been dedicated to presenting some of the most important names in contemporary art from Slovenia and the region. The project is supported by the Embassy of the Republic of Slovenia in Montenegro, further affirming the cultural ties between the two countries.