April 20, 2022 – The Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts (HAZU) has announced its prestige award winners for 2021, based on a decision from 30 March. The awards will traditionally be presented on HAZU Day, on 29 April.

24Sata recaps the winners. For the field of social sciences, the award goes to Dr. sc. Katarina Horvat for the book "Household servants in Zagreb 1880-1914". (Srednja Europa d.o.o., Zagreb, 2021).

Prof. dr. sc. Marcela Hanzer has won the Mathematical, Physical, and Chemical Sciences Award for outstanding recent scientific contributions in the theory of representations of classic P-adic groups and the theory of automorphic forms and the Langlands program, published in a series of six papers from 2018 to 2021 in prestigious international journals.

For the field of natural sciences, the award was given to Dr. sc. Petra Bajo for scientific research on paleoclimatic changes through the past based on the geochemical characteristics of speleothems, published in 24 scientific papers in the last five years, and for discovering the role of Earth's orbital parameters on the development and duration of transitions between colder and warmer periods in the Pleistocene, published in the Journal of Science in 2020.

Prof. dr. sc. Ivana Tlak Gajger was awarded for the field of medical sciences, for scientific achievements by publishing 30 scientific articles in the last five years (2017-2021), which form one thematic unit entitled The Biology and Pathology of Bees.

Prof. dr. sc. Ekrem Čaušević has won an award in the field of philological sciences, for the book "Structure, syntax, and semantics of infinitive verb forms in Turkish. Turkish and Croatian languages in comparison and contrast" (Ibis grafika, Zagreb, 2018).

In the field of literature, the award went to Ivan Lovrenović for the book "Putovi su, snovi li su" published by Fraktura in 2019.

In the field of fine arts, the award was given to Milan Bešlić for authoring exhibitions and promoting the work of art of academician Edo Murtić on the 100^th anniversary of his birth.

In the fields of music art and musicology, prof. art. Mladen Tarbuk was awarded for the composition Sinfonia, which premiered on April 27, 2017, as part of the Music Biennale, at the concert of the HRT Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Pierre-André Valade.

Assoc. prof. dr. sc. Jonatan Lerga is the winner in the field of technical sciences for the work "Advanced Digital Signal Processing and Machine Learning", a scientific unit with 28 papers, 13 of which were published in Q1 journals, and 11 in Q2 journals, and Dr. sc. Lerga is the first author of five and the second author of ten works.

The choice for HAZU awards for the highest scientific and artistic achievements in 2021 was made by the Presidency of the Academy at a session on March 30, and the winners will be presented as part of the HAZU Day celebrations on April 29.

Before that, the regular assembly of the Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts will be held, the first in physical form after more than two years. At the assembly, among others, the President of the Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts, Academician Velimir Neidhardt, will report on the work of the Academy so far.

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March 14th, 2022 - The entire Memorial Collection of Maksimilijan Vanka will be restored and moved from Zagreb back into its home on Korčula

As announced by Korčula Mayor Nika Silić Maroević, the lovely villa in Korčula town that was once owned by Croatian artist Maksimilijan Vanka is finally to be restored.

In 1935, Vanka moved to the US where he's best remembered for painting the Millvale Murals in the St. Nicholas Croatian Catholic Church. The renowned painter and sculptor used to spend summers on Korčula island, where he founded an art colony and socialised with his fellow artists.

His former holiday home is known as one of the most beautiful villas in town, located near the monastery of St. Nicholas, reports Dubrovački vjesnik.

After Vanka’s death in 1963, his widow Margaret Stetten Vanka and daughter Peggy Vanka Brasko donated two houses in Korčula to the Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts (HAZU), along with 47 of Vanka’s artworks created in Korčula and the US.

The other, smaller villa donated to the HAZU by the Vanka family had a different fate. In the early 90s, it was transferred into private ownership and has been sold since.

The bigger villa, now to be restored, used to house the Memorial Collection of Maksimilijan Vanka. Due to poor conditions in the villa, the art collection was moved to Zagreb and is currently kept at the Strossmayer Gallery of Old Masters.

Two years ago, it was announced that the entire collection will be restored, with funds secured by the Society of Maksilimijan Vanka’s Friends from the US. Once the restoration is completed, the artworks should be moved back to Korčula, but it’s not yet known when this is supposed to take place.

Renovation of the villa should have started two years ago when the president of the Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts (HAZU) signed a cooperation agreement with the then Mayor of Korčula, providing for the renovation, reconstruction and adaptation of Villa Vanka and the restoration and return of Vanka's art collection to Korčula.

Unfortunately, the global pandemic began shortly after the agreement was signed, so the plans had to be put on hold for a while.

‘In the meantime, potential investors expressed certain interests that the HAZU approved as well, so we will amend the existing agreement a bit in order to further define certain details’, announced Mayor Silić Maroević.

Amendments to the agreement mainly relate to the catering business conducted in the villa, which proved not to be a good decision in the past, according to the mayor. Ten years ago, the gallery was renovated, but not in a dignified manner, she pointed out, and part of the gallery was leased by a catering business, which isn’t acceptable to the City of Korčula or the HAZU.

Villa Vanka will now be renovated and used exclusively as a gallery, the only exception being the lower part of the warehouse which might eventually be leased out for service activities. This will be defined by the new agreement, said Mayor Silić Maroević.

Although Korčula boasts incredible cultural heritage and numerous acclaimed artists, the town sorely lacks gallery spaces. This is yet another reason why everyone’s looking forward to the renovation of Villa Vanka, with the new gallery seen as a crucial venue for the cultural life in Korčula.

ZAGREB, 8 Feb 2022 - On the occasion of the 70th anniversary of Britain's Queen Elizabeth II's rule, the Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts is marking the 50th anniversary of her visit to Zagreb on 20 October 1972, when she said that as a maritime nation, Great Britain had for centuries had strong ties with Croatia and its coast.

In a statement issued on Tuesday, HAZU recalled that Queen Elizabeth II, accompanied by her husband, Prince Philip, and their daughter, Princess Anne, visited Zagreb during her five-day official visit to then Yugoslavia, when she also visited Dubrovnik, Đakovo, Pula and the Brijuni archipelago.

She arrived by train from Đakovo at Zagreb's Central Station where a welcome ceremony was held during which the British, Yugoslav and Croatian anthems were played.

Queen Elizabeth II was then taken in an open-top car to the city centre, where she took a walk and talked to some of the citizens who gathered to see her and who gave her a warm welcome, after which she attended a formal dinner organised at the government building in her honour by her host Jakov Blažević, Parliament Speaker of the then Socialist Republic of Croatia, at the time the highest political official in Croatia.

After the dinner, Queen Elizabeth II visited the HAZU building near Zagreb's Zrinjevac park.

HAZU draws attention to the text of Queen Elizabeth's toast, carried by newspapers at the time, in which she expressed delight at visiting the ancient beautiful city of Zagreb, the centre of Croatia's rich history and culture, and noted that she and her family had also visited Dubrovnik, seeing some of the amazing coastal landscape, as well as Đakovo.

She said that Zagreb's impressive development over the previous 25 years reflected an energetic determination of all its citizens to build a happy and progressive nation. As a maritime nation, Britain has for centuries had closer ties to Croatia and its long coast than with any other part of Yugoslavia. Today new ties are being established and more and more Britons arrive to enjoy the hospitality of your resorts, she said at the time.

The Queen then expressed hope that the British would in return make an equally useful contribution to Croatia's economy, stressing that she and her family were very much impressed by everything they had seen, especially the warm welcome they were given, and wished success and the best of luck to all Croatians.

October the 18th, 2021 - Trsteno Arboretum is one of the most beautiful little places hidden away on the southern Dalmatian coastline to visit. Filled with rich plantlife and boasting million dollar views across the Adriatic Sea, it's the perfect place for a recharge. The brand new Trsteno Arboretum Education and Multimedia Centre will only add to its allure.

As Morski writes, as part of the "Historical Gardens of the Dubrovnik area" project, the Trsteno Arboretum Education and Multimedia Centre was officially opened, having been partly financed by European Union (EU) funds.

The brand new centre will contribute to the interpretation of the arboretum's stunning natural heritage, work to further increase the tourist attractiveness of the area and the development of the local economy. There will be education sessions and workshops for locals, tourists and visitors of all ages on the traditional cultivation of olives and vines, the use of medicinal and aromatic plants, ornithofauna and entomofauna of Trsteno Arboretum and the role of forests in the reclamation of negative environmental changes.

The new Trsteno Arboretum Education and Multimedia Centre was built with ''being green'' firmly in mind, meaning everything involved sustainable procurement, which is shown in the use of indigenous materials and products, such as wooden joinery (windows and doors), stone facade finishing, wooden pergola constructions on terraces and so on. As part of the project, a thematic-educational trail was also fully arranged in the olive groves of the Arboretum.

The second main activity of the project has also now been announced, and that involves the procurement of a ship and the opening of a new ferry line that will connect Trsteno Arboretum and the island of Lokrum which lies just across from the City of Dubrovnik and will likely prove extremely popular with nature lovers needing a breath of fresh air away from the hustle and bustle of Croatia's tourism Mecca. The aim of the project is to preserve local biodiversity, encourage the sustainable use of natural heritage and promote its cultural and historical values ​ through the interpretation and presentation of protected natural heritage, thus contributing to sustainable development at both a local and regional level.

The total value of the project stands at 18,289,422.37 kuna and most of the grants for it have been provided from the European Regional Development Fund. In addition to the project beneficiary, the Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts, the Lokrum Reserve Public Institution, the Dubrovnik Tourist Board and the Dubrovnik Art Association without Borders (DART) are all participating in the project.

This beautiful arboretum is otherwise very well known for its historical parks and its impressive and vast collection of Mediterranean and exotic plant species. It was founded in 1948 on the site and base of the historic country estate of the Dubrovnik noble family Gucetic-Gozze, dating from 1494, and is protected by law. Covering an area of ​​28 hectares, it unites several different units: a historic Renaissance park with a summer house, a historic neo-romantic park, a historic olive grove, and natural vegetation boasting numerous tree species from near and far.

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