Category: Karas Gallery Exhibitions
ŽELJKO BELJAN &
ALEKSANDRA SAŠKA GRUDEN
GUMI TWIST
2.6.-23.6.2026.
KARAS GALLERY
On Friday, 26st of June Željko Beljan and Aleksandra Saška Gruden open their solo exhibition entitled Gumi Twist at 7 pm in Karas Gallery (Ulica kralja Zvonimira 58).
In her foreword Marija Kamber emphasizes:
“The exhibition Gumi Twist, named after the popular playground game in which players jump and weave through a loop of elastic stretched between two participants, explores games, toys, and playing through newly created objects by Željko Beljan, video works by Aleksandra Saška Gruden, and the transformation of the gallery into a site of interaction. Much like the way we remember childhood games, Gumi Twist approaches play through fragments or interpretations of fragments. Rather than presenting complete games accompanied by printed instructions, it offers movement, rhythm, sound imagined from a silent object, a close-up of a hand, or a toy waiting to be set in motion. (…)
By occupying the space of Karas Gallery, Gruden and Beljan create a temporary world of play in which the gallery is transformed into a kind of playground, where the artworks are not untouchable artefacts displayed on walls but prompts and sets of rules that encourage visitors to move through the space and explore the fragments presented to them. A gesture seen in a video becomes a proposed gesture in the gallery; a coloured line across a grey floor is transformed into a path leading towards the exploration of a toy. The rules are written nowhere, and interpretation remains open: jump; stop; push; make a sound, the choice belongs to the players.”
Artists’ biographies:
Željko Beljan (Vukovar, 1984) is a visual artist whose practice explores the phenomenon of manual labour and its place within contemporary art. He is particularly interested in the relationship between manual labour and amateur and recreational sport, with an emphasis on participation and audience involvement in the realisation of his works. He graduated in 2021 from the Department of Animated Film and New Media at the Academy of Fine Arts in Zagreb. He is an alumnus of the WHW Academy (2022) and was a finalist for the Radoslav Putar Award (2023). Since 2011, he has participated in numerous group exhibitions in Croatia and the wider region and has had several solo exhibitions.
Aleksandra Saška Gruden is an academic sculptor who graduated from the Academy of Fine Arts and Design in Ljubljana in 2004. Since 2006, she has held the status of an independent cultural practitioner. Through her interdisciplinary approach, she has established a strong presence on the contemporary art scene both in the country and internationally. Her work frequently explores questions of identity, historical memory, and social position, using a wide range of materials and technologies to create immersive, thought-provoking experiences. She has created several public installations in Slovenia and abroad, and her works are held in the collections of a number of prominent cultural institutions. Gruden has led sculpture symposia and exhibition programmes and for six years served as President of the Artistic Council of the Ljubljana Fine Artists Society (DLUL). As a cultural critic, she also collaborates with Radio Slovenia and Likovne besede, a Slovenian visual arts periodical.
The exhibition will be open during the period from 26. to 3.7.2026.
Working hours of Karas Gallery
Wednesday, Thursday, Friday 4pm – 8pm
Tuesday, Saturday 10am – 1pm
On Sundays and Mondays closed.
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Organizer: HDLU
With the support of: Ministry of Culture and Media of the Republic of Croatia, City of Zagreb
IVANA GALIĆ
ICICLES AND GLASS BEADS
2.6.-23.6.2026.
KARAS GALLERY
On Tuesday, 2nd of June Ivana Galić opens her solo exhibition entitled Icicles and Glass Beads at 7 pm in Karas Gallery (Ulica kralja Zvonimira 58).
In her forward, artist emphasizes:
“ In Icicles and Glass Beads, I explore the material of glass through the media of light, texture, form, movement and sound, creating new environments – visual, auditory and tactile; material and digital; calm and harmonious; spontaneous and planned. (…)
Glass, also described as an amorphous solid, a rigid liquid or a supercooled liquid, is characterised on the molecular level by an unusual and irregular arrangement of atoms that prevents it from being classified as either solid or liquid, becoming a category of its own instead. This elusive state of glass prompted me to reflect, through this work, on polarities and the in-between states they open up. The space between, within which this work moves, includes the relationship between the natural and the digital, security and insecurity, stability and instability, ease and anxiety, chance and predetermination, rigidity and freedom, as well as control and surrender. Like glass, which neither settles into a solid, clearly defined substance with fixed boundaries nor yields entirely to the free drift and flow of water, I too swim somewhere between these polarities, resting at the intersections of their tensions and entanglements.”
Biography:
Ivana Galić (b. 1997) graduated in New Media from the Academy of Fine Arts at the University of Zagreb. In her work, she draws inspiration from everyday life, which she experiences as both ordinary and filled with fantasy and wonder, carrying within it the potential for imagining new realities. The real and the surreal intertwine, creating a new, third space of imagination. She finds inspiration in her own experiences, in different states of consciousness such as daydreaming and meditation, in various emotional and perceptual states, as well as in favourite books, stories told by people around her, internet culture, her playlists and fantastical worlds. She describes her genre as ethereal wave–post-internet romanticism. Dreamlike atmospheres and nostalgia are often present in her work. She is interested in the relationship between nature, technology and the human being, as well as in themes of slowing down and resistance through rest. She enjoys connecting the digital and the natural, creating dreamlike worlds, safe zones and micro-utopias.
The exhibition will be open during the period from 2. to 23.6.2026.
Working hours of Karas Gallery
Wednesday, Thursday, Friday 4pm – 8pm
Tuesday, Saturday 10am – 1pm
On Sundays and Mondays closed.
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Organizer: HDLU
With the support of: Ministry of Culture and Media of the Republic of Croatia, City of Zagreb
17 May 2026
CREART 3.O. / KARAS+KVART
VANA GAĆINA & ALYONA FUTSUR
21.-24.5.2026.
KARAS GALLERY
We invite you to join the exhibition of Vana Gaćina and Alyona Fustur, which is the result of three weeks of intensive research and work as part of the residency program Karas+kvart, on Thursday, 21st of May at 7pm in Karas Gallery (Ulica kralja Zvonimira 58).
The exhibition brings the new works of Croatian multimedia artist Vana Gaćina “FluctuHood” and Ukrainian artist, videographer and performer Alyona Futsur “Unwanted Voices”, which are based on revealing the hidden potential of urban and natural remains of Karas’ and nearby neighborhoods.
Installation “FluctuHood” (Vana Gaćina) is a research project based on the consideration of energy availability in a contemporary urban context, viewed through the prism of interdisciplinary artistic practice. The focus of the research is the Karas Gallery neighbourhood viewed as a microecological system within which neglected material flows – such as biowaste, soil, sediments, and wastewater – can be identified and which have the potential for transformation into useful energy forms.
Locally available materials from the environment of the aforementioned city district are used for the experimental production of bioelectrochemical batteries. The energy obtained from these batteries serves as the main source for the installation and is translated into a sound structure through algorithmic processes, forming an interactive sound installation.
The sound structure is designed as an interactive system adapted to visitors, which allows them to actively participate and ‘play’ using the energy of their own environment, with each of its segments generating a recognizable sound expression.
Audiovisual project “Unwanted Voices” (Alyona Futsur) explors the hidden sounds of environmental and social pollution in Zagreb. Using hydrophone (underwater microphone) and geophone (analog sensor that converts ground vibrations into electrical signals), Alyona Futsur recorded underwater sounds of city fountains and lakes, as well as low-frequency vibrations from urban and natural locations marked by garbage and noise pollution. The project investigated whether polluted environments have a “voice” that cannot be heard without specialized equipment, and it found… they do.
Alongside the recordings, Alyona interviewed residents about these places. Their emotions and associations influenced the color palette, scene titles, and editing process, making the public co-authors of the final film. Through both technology and human testimony, the project gives voice to overlooked spaces, invisible tensions, and collective emotional landscapes of Zagreb that remain silent and overseen.
Artists’ biographies:
Vana Gaćina is a Croatian visual artist whose practice bridges painting, video, and multimedia installation. After graduating in painting from the Academy of Fine Arts in Zagreb, she continued her education in video art at the Academy of Fine Arts in Ljubljana. Her work explores the evolving relationship between contemporary art and technology, with a particular focus on how artistic expression transforms within new media environments. Through multimedia installations, Vana integrates traditional visual practices with digital tools, investigating expanded models of perception, representation, and interaction. Currently a PhD candidate in visual arts at the Academy of Fine Arts and Design in Ljubljana, her research focuses on the aesthetics of artificial intelligence. Her doctoral work critically examines the role of algorithmic systems in contemporary artistic production. Vana has exhibited in numerous solo and group exhibitions both in Croatia and internationally. She is a member of the Croatian Association of Artists (HDLU) and the Croatian Freelance Artists’ Association (HZSU).
Alyona Futsur is a multidisciplinary artist from Ukraine, based in Slovakia, working across performance, photography, video, and music.
With a foundation in psychology, transformational coaching, and somatic practices, her work explores the intersection of art and healing through raw, improvised, and emotionally charged expression. Alyona’s methodology centers on mind-free experimentation, intuition, and embodied experience—favoring imperfection, spontaneity, and unconventional aesthetics such as distorted imagery, non-linear video, experimental sound, and expressive embodiment.
Performance and film serve as key mediums for translating inner processes into shared, real-time experiences, while sound and music deepen emotional connection beyond language. This approach has been shaped by Alyona’s projects, including experimental films, live performances, and the music album Garage Renaissance, in which she embraced improvisation as a core creative force.
Drawing from personal experiences, including trauma and neurodivergence, her work challenges perception and invites reflection on identity, emotion, and societal conditioning. Her art has been exhibited and screened internationally across Europe and the Americas. In 2025, Alyona published the self-coaching memoir 365 Days of Love: How to Self-love Without Money, Mission, and Myself, which she wrote during one of the most difficult periods of her depression, further expanding her practice into writing as a tool for transformation.
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Associates: Miodrag Gladović and Ur Institu (FluctuHood project)
Thanks: Tin Dožić, Margita Grubiša, Museum of Contemporary Art Zagreb
Gallery working hours:
Friday-Sunday: 10am-6pm
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Within the project:
Partners:
Supported by:
Co-funded by the European Union – CREA-CULT-2023-COOP. The views and opinions expressed are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the official views of the European Union or the European Education and Culture Executive Agency (EACEA). Neither the European Union nor the European Commission can be held responsible for them.
[Project number: 101128499]
The views expressed in this announcement are the sole responsibility of HDLU and do not necessarily reflect the opinion of the Government Office for Cooperation with NGOs
DAVID WILHELM
PRESENCE, UNKNOWN: PHASE V
7.-28.4.2026.
KARAS GALLERY
On Tuesday, 7th of April David Wilhelm opens his solo exhibition entitled PRESENCE, UNKNOWN: PHASE V at 7 pm in Karas Gallery (Ulica kralja Zvonimira 58).
In her foreword Iva Jurić emphasizes:
In the work PRESENCE, UNKNOWN: PHASE V, artist David Wilhelm continues to explore ritual and apotropaic practices, examining their physical and digital potential within a contemporary context through a series of iterative developments. Starting from their traditional function as protection against evil and misfortune, the artist relocates these practices into a speculative space situated between archaeology, fiction, and the digital imaginary. (…)
The installation combines video with a series of phallus-shaped amulets made of red clay. The amulets appear as pseudo-historical objects without a clearly defined provenance, simultaneously archaic and timeless. Their materiality evokes tradition—specifically archaic techniques of making and archaeological remains—while the context of the installation situates them within a speculative narrative that the artist develops in parallel in the video. Their spatial arrangement suggests that they belong to a broader, yet unfinished system of belief.
Biography:
David Wilhelm (2000) studies at the Department of Animated Film and New Media at the Academy of Fine Arts, University of Zagreb. In their artistic practice they explore the relationship between the digital and the physical, queer identity, and experimentation with sound, text, and video. Most of their time is spent playing video games or working on scaffolding at building restoration sites.
They exhibited their work in group exhibitions in Vienna, Pula, Split, Zadar and Zagreb, as well as solo exhibitions in Split and Zagreb. They participated in residencies Garden of Eden in Bale (2022), What’s Masc? in Berlin (2022) and W/ri/gh/ting Archives through Artistic Research – Co_Lab #1 in Split (2023).
The exhibition will be open during the period from 7. to 28.4.2026.
Working hours of Karas Gallery
Wednesday, Thursday, Friday 4pm – 8pm
Tuesday, Saturday 10am – 1pm
On Sundays and Mondays closed.
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http://karasarthub.eu
Organizer: HDLU
With the support of: Ministry of Culture and Media of the Republic of Croatia, City of Zagreb
28 January 2026
JELENA BOGDANIĆ
VENDING MACHINE
4.-24.2.2026.
KARAS GALLERY
On Wednesday, 4th of February Jelena Bogdanić opens her solo exhibition entitled Vending Machine at 7 pm in Karas Gallery (Ulica kralja Zvonimira 58).
In her forward, Mihaela Zajec emphasizes:
“Bogdanić’s Vending Machine is therefore neither the first nor certainly the last attempt to explain the world from the perspective of one’s own and the general artistic role and position, yet it remains one of the most direct expressions of this endeavour in contemporary Croatian art. It is an “installation” that approaches the theme both literally and with ironic distance, absurdist and ethical in its emphasis on contradictions, while simultaneously blurring their boundaries and frameworks.
Essentially, this self-service machine is a reflection of modern and contemporary society, its need for the quick and easy, for technological advancement and optimisation, for efficiency and consumption, but also for a return to simpler times. By subversively appropriating this proto-robot creature, the artist presents her sculptural works as equally hollowed-out content, but with the aim of opening a dialogue. A dialogue about time, about society, about artistic value, about apathy.”
Biography:
Jelena Bogdanić (1998, Zagreb) graduated in 2022 from the Academy of Fine Arts in Zagreb, Art Education Department, in the class of Associate Professor Vlasta Žanić and co-mentor Professor Ines Krasić. She spent the fifth semester of her studies at the Faculty of Fine Arts in Belgrade, in the class of Mileta Prodanović, as part of the Erasmus+ exchange programme. Through objects and installations, she explores the materiality, aesthetics, and poetics of single-use plastic, achieving its unpredictable transformations through melting. She has exhibited in several group exhibitions in Zagreb, Labin, and Dublin. She is currently employed as a teacher at the School of Applied Arts and Design.
The exhibition will be open during the period from 4. to 24.2.2026.
Working hours of Karas Gallery
Wednesday, Thursday, Friday 4pm – 8pm
Tuesday, Saturday 10am – 1pm
On Sundays and Mondays closed.
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http://karasarthub.eu
Organizer: HDLU
With the support of: Ministry of Culture and Media of the Republic of Croatia, City of Zagreb
05 January 2026
LUKA KUŠEVIĆ
TELLURIC CURRENTS
12.1.-27.1.2026.
KARAS GALLERY
On Monday, 12th of January Luka Kušević opens his solo exhibition entitled Telluric currents at 7 pm in Karas Gallery (Ulica kralja Zvonimira 58).
In his foreword Luka Kušević emphasizes:
“In my work, I trace the movements, gestures, and vibrations from which earthly scenes are composed. It is not the scene itself that interests me, but the processes that precede it: the motions, flows, and transformations unfolding beneath the visible surface. In this sense, landscape serves as a starting point rather than the goal of the painting. I try to avoid lapsing into landscape painting, as it often immobilises movement and thereby closes off space for the unpredictable and aleatory. Instead of a stable image, I am interested in space in the making, space that is built through the very act of painting, through the constant mobilisation of colour and form.”
Biography:
Luka Kušević was born in Zagreb in 1993, where he completed his secondary education at the School of Applied Arts and Design. In 2017, he graduated in Painting from the Academy of Fine Arts in Zagreb, in the class of Professor Zoltan Novak. He has been exhibiting solo since 2018, with notable solo exhibitions including those at Forum Gallery (2018), Matica Hrvatska Gallery (2022), SC Gallery (2022), PM/Extended Media Gallery (2024), and Kranjčar Gallery (2024). He has participated in numerous group exhibitions, including Erste Fragments 16 (2020), the 57th Zagreb Salon (2022), the 7th Biennial of Painting (2024), and the exhibition Y to Z: Construction Site of a New Generation at the National Museum of Modern Art (Octagon). At the 6th Biennial of Painting, he was co-awarded the Iva Vraneković – Vladimir Dodig Trokut Award. He lives and works in Zagreb.
The exhibition will be open during the period from 12.1. to 27.1.2026.
Working hours of Karas Gallery
Wednesday, Thursday, Friday 4pm – 8pm
Tuesday, Saturday 10am – 1pm
On Sundays and Mondays closed.
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http://karasarthub.eu
Organizer: HDLU
With the support of: Ministry of Culture and Media of the Republic of Croatia, City of Zagreb
12 November 2025
DOMAGOJ BURILOVIĆ
DORF
19.11.-6.12.2025.
KARAS GALLERY
On Wednesday, 19th of November Domagoj Burilović opens his solo exhibition entitled Dorf at 7 pm in Karas Gallery (Ulica kralja Zvonimira 58).
In his foreword Domagoj Burilović emphasizes:
„The current emigration of the population most directly contributes to the destruction of villages, as they do not provide an adequate quality of life. Post offices, health centres, shops, and schools are closing… houses are abandoned, yards overgrown with weeds. Historic architecture is the first to decay. Most of these structures are deserted and dilapidated, and some of the photographed buildings collapsed shortly after being photographed.
Inscribed in the rural architecture of Slavonia is the historical prosperity of the region, but also its present-day decline, a thread connecting two opposing migratory waves. The irony of history lies in the fact that Germans once settled Slavonian villages and improved the quality of life, and now it is precisely the rural population who are largely moving to Germany in search of a better life. ”
Biography:
Domagoj Burilović is born in 1987 in Vinkovci. Graduated in Painting from the Academy of Arts in Split in 2012. Through photography, he addresses political and social themes, and in recent years has focused on the current emigration from Slavonia. He has exhibited in numerous group and solo exhibitions in Croatia and abroad. His works have received awards and have been included in various collections.
The exhibition will be open during the period from 19.11. to 6.12.2025.
Working hours of Karas Gallery
Wednesday, Thursday, Friday 4pm – 8pm
Tuesday, Saturday 10am – 1pm
On Sundays and Mondays closed.
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http://karasarthub.eu
Organizer: HDLU
With the support of: Ministry of Culture and Media of the Republic of Croatia, City of Zagreb
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