Zbirka slika fr. Vinka Marije Draganje u splitskom dominikanskom samostanu
Fr. Vinko Marija Draganja’s Collection of Paintings at the Split Dominican Monastery

Summary/Abstract: 37 canvases by Fr. Vinko Marija Draganja are kept at the Split Dominican Monastery. Fr. Draganja (Split, 20th February 1856 – Split, 6th May 1926) was a Dominican friar and a painter. He was intorduced to Fr. Celestin Medović during his Novitiate year in Dubrovnik, with whom he exchanged experiences. During his senior years at grammar school, Fr. Draganja attended painting classes under the guidance of Dr Emil Vacchetti, who also taught Emanuel Vidović. Then, as an apprentice at Saint Francis’ Monastery in Zadar, he was taught by the academy-trained painter Fr. Josip Rossi. He continued his education at the Florence Academy of Art and, upon graduation, returned to his hometown as the first academy-trained painter. In his lifetime Fr. Draganja never arranged a stand-alone exhibition, but exhibited some of his paintings at exhibitions arranged at People’s Square and Saint Catherine’s Church. After his death, his paintings appeared occasionaly at local and national retrospective exhibitions and his opus was nearly forgotten. Movable objects from the Saint Catherine’s Church and the Dominican monastery were catalogued. The process itself, which was conducted within the scope of regular activities by the Ministry of Culture - Conservation Department in Split, revealed the opportunity to reassess and restore Fr. Draganja’s opus and, finally, to register his paintings as the part of cultural heritage. Conservation-restoration procedures that had been performed on 36 paintings provided thorough analysis of Fr. Draganja’s artistry and specific painting technique. His painting technique and selection of materials remained constant whereas the qualities of his paintings varied. The main objective of the procedures was to stabilize the layers of paint and then to restore deteriorated and lost parts. The procedures were based on the principles of moderate restoration-conservation intervention which did not interfere with the genuine qualities of the paintings. In the process of conservation, the restorers concluded that similar procedures had already been performed on ten paintings. The analysis of materials and methods used enabled them to date the procedures at the second half of the 20th century. Those procedures were also based on the restoration concept of mild intervention. The conservation-restoration process allowed understanding of Fr. Draganja’s works of art, which facilitated the very attribution of the painting Smrt sv. Dominika (the death of St. Dominic) to the artist himself.

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