She lived through pictures

Namely, due to her condition, Slava showed no interest in socializing with other children. Children avoided the moody little girl who could not speak, so her best friends were her brushes and pastels. Nevertheless, Slava often attracted attention even without saying a single word. Because she was a real beauty, with regular features, long blonde hair and a dreamy look.

One of her acquaintances described Slava like this: "She was a restless child, she ran in solitude. Endlessly. You couldn't shout for her or call her. She came back tired and then again, alone in the corner of the room, she started her only entertainment and consolation: drawing."

As a girl, Slava Raškaj had an interesting habit. She often secretly carved flowers into wooden furniture. And with that little mischief, she showed signs of her artistic talent very early on.

And the view of the Kupa River, the softest green grass in the meadows, the dense forest in the distance and colorful bouquets of flowers inspired her to sketch studies of nature's gifts in her small notebook - dandelions, white sedges, milkweed and other all kinds of plants.

Eight-year-old Slava was separated from her home and her lovely pastimes in nature by sending her to the Institute for the Deaf and Dumb in Vienna. She finished primary and secondary school there. But despite her wealthy background and the influence her family had in European cities, Slava suffered many rejections because of her condition. Namely, in the nineteenth century, the public looked at deaf and mute people as mentally retarded, which is why they were marked all their lives.

But thanks to her natural gift for drawing, Slava still found her place in the big world. She received her first art training in Vienna. An interesting fact from the time of her studies is that as a fifteen-year-old Slava painted rather unusual motifs compared to her previous and later work. Namely, three of her drawings, which depict a knight, armor and weapons, date from 1892.

But after returning home to Ozalj, Slava turned to painting nature again. That's when her two famous watercolors were created: "Girl with a Dog in the Forest" and "Bath at Ozalj". According to the critics, the pictures are childish and unskillful, but they still determine the topics that Slava will deal with during his short but significant career.

Ivan Otoić Muha was the first to notice Slava's painting talent. He persuaded her father Vjekoslav Raškaj to send her to Zagreb so that she could continue learning painting. In 1885, Slava moved from his native Ozalj to Zagreb. Namely, Ivan was a friend of Vlaha Bukovac and decided to ask the great painter to teach Slava. However, he refused. Then Otoić took her to Beli Čikoša. He accepted young Slava and became her mentor and role model for many years.

He taught her to paint with oil, and the basis of the painting was dark colors. However, Slava soon separated from her teacher's style. She replaced dark tones with bright ones. She stopped painting in oil and continued in watercolor. She painted mostly still life together with objects from Lenka Muha Otoić's showcase.

Critics agree that Slava's watercolors represent the highest range of Croatian watercolor painting in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. They say that she had an excellent sense of the ratio of pigment and water, her watercolors are airy and light and as such represents the concept of an ideal watercolor. But her light technique was not modern at that time. That is why Slava did not become famous during her lifetime, but her creative gift and innovation can be seen precisely in her unusual painting technique - because she could not learn it from anyone.

And the place where many of Slava's works were created was quite unusual. The Ilic Institute for Deaf and Mute Children, where Slava lived, used to be a hospital. After the opening of the Sisters of Mercy hospital in Vinogradska, its premises belonged to the Institute. One of those rooms was the morgue of the hospital. The Director of the Institute, who is also Slava's friend, turned the abandoned morgue into Slava's studio.

The modesty of the studio was described by the witnesses as follows: "The smell of mold could be felt in the freshly painted space due to the humidity, while in the middle of the studio there was a long table with two or three brushes, a glass of water and a box of paints." Most of her still life paintings were created there, shrouded in melancholy and coldness, as a kind of reflection of the place where they were created."

During her stay in Zagreb, with her friend Lenka Otoić, the painter often walked to the Botanical Garden, Ksaver Hill and Maksimir Park. The girls always went for walks with equipment. They were obliged to carry a case with paints and canvas so that, through pictures, they could forever preserve the beauty around them. And so, during sunny Zagreb mornings, the famous Slavina "Lopoči" were created.

Slavina's love and deep respect for nature is evident in the way she painted. And during the winter, she often painted outdoors. On her little table, in the snow, in the winter, she would paint in the cold wind, until her delicate hands were completely frozen from November.

Although Slava never had an independent exhibition during her life, she still achieved significant success for an artist of that era. She exhibited at the Croatian Salon in 1898/99, at the Austro-Hungarian exhibition in Petrograd in 1899, and certainly the greatest success was the display of her works at the World Exhibition in Paris in 1900. In the "City of Light", the Lopoči from the Botanical Garden hung in addition to the two Zagreb vistas.

In the fall of 1899, Slava developed the initial stage of pulmonary tuberculosis. Slava spent the summer of 1901 in Ozlje. In Ozlje, she continued to paint and "pulled more and more into herself." She lived only in her work," said her brother Juraj. During the fall, she stayed in Orahovica with her sister Paula.

Then she returned to Zagreb. Weakened by a physical illness, the doctors also claimed that Slava had become too mentally unstable, so in the summer of 1902 she was sent to the Institute for the Mentally Ill. During a period of poor mental health, she painted medallions. They were very unusual.

In fact, the main character was a mysterious unnamed woman. And Slava would add titles to these works such as "A woman walks in the spring", "A woman is followed by a green cloud", "A storm has struck a woman", "A bloody cloud is coming to a woman"...

In the medical records, there are records of the gradual deterioration of Slavin's mental health. Thus, it is written that in the last months of her life, Slava "played" by sitting at the table for a long time, and she would arrange unrecognizable figures from the spinning wheel.

Cerovac critically reflects on such claims, recalling that "she wrote down, 'drew' exactly one of her 'games' in our watercolor from 1899, three years before someone else's laconic record from the 'History of Disease' about her behavior".

Sanja Franković concludes on this basis that "the game, incoherent to the environment, previously existed as an artistic act". "The circle of Slavin's life began and closed with communication with surrounding objects," writes the author.

The great painter died in 1906 in Zagreb, leaving behind an enviable number of works. However, one of our most important painters only got a solo exhibition fifty years after her untimely death.