Ivana Tomljenović-Meller

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Ivana Tomljenović-Meller (born Ivana Tomljenović in 1906 in Zagreb , Austria-Hungary ; died in 1988 in Zagreb, Yugoslavia ) was a Yugoslav photographer, graphic designer, and art teacher .

Life

Ivana Tomljenović was athletic and practiced athletics, skiing, basketball and handball. During her college years in the 1920s, she held multiple records as an athlete and was popular with the sports press.

From 1924 she studied at the Royal Academy of Arts in Zagreb and graduated in 1928 with a Cum Laude diploma . Then she went to the arts and crafts school in Vienna . There she broke off her studies in 1929 to go to the State Bauhaus in Dessau . Tomljenović took part in Josef Albers ' preliminary course . In 1930 she belonged to the newly founded photography class under the direction of Walter Peterhans . Her main interest was the graphic design of posters and photo editing.

At the Bauhaus Dessau, Ivana Tomljenović, who came from a wealthy family from banking and coal mining, became an emancipated, politically left-wing intellectual. She developed into an avowed communist and became a member of the Communist Party of Germany . She had the code name Wirinea Hölz . In 1930, like other communist students at the Bauhaus, she was de-registered . When the Bauhaus director Hannes Meyer was dismissed without notice for political reasons in 1930, she left Dessau with other students. She went to Berlin , where she worked as a set designer and graphic artist on the Piscator stages alongside John Heartfield . From 1931 she officially studied literature at the Sorbonne in Paris, but worked as a communist agent. In 1932 Tomljenović moved to Prague and worked as a graphic designer. There she married Alfred Meller in 1933, who owned an advertising company. Both designed spectacular shop window decorations with movable and illuminated elements for department stores. After the death of her husband in 1934, she returned to her homeland and worked as a graphic designer and lecturer in Belgrade. From 1938 she lived in Zagreb and after the Second World War she became an art teacher, where she taught in schools until 1962. Her photographic works from the Bauhaus era are in the collection of the Museum of Contemporary Art in Zagreb.

Works

  • The Bauhaus in 57 seconds , 1930, amateur film

literature

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Tomljenović-Meller, Ivana
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Tomljenović, Ivana (maiden name); Tomljenović, Koka (nickname)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Yugoslav photographer, graphic designer and art teacher
DATE OF BIRTH 1906
PLACE OF BIRTH Zagreb
DATE OF DEATH 1988
Place of death Zagreb