Collection manager:

Kristina Majcen
Trainee curator
kristina@trakoscan.hr

The Paintings and Prints Collection consists of over 200 oil on canvas paintings and about twenty graphic prints, representing an exceptionally valuable historical and artistic collection. The majority of the paintings are portraits commissioned and painted from the late 16th to the early 20th century. Landscapes, allegories and scenes of sacred themes are represented to a lesser extent.

Family portraits from the first period of the Drašković family’s ascent were painted according to the customs of Central European portraiture and are the works of unknown painters, while during the time of Ivan V (1669-1733), a gallery of about twenty oval portraits of family members, ruling house members, military commanders, and prominent political figures was created. Their authors are also unknown, but they were extremely gifted painters. During the time of Josip Kazimir (1716-1765), a gallery of 49 portraits of officers from the Joseph Graf Esterházy infantry regiment was created. Family members were also painted, and an abridged family genealogy was also brought to Trakošćan as a gift. During the time of Ivan V and Josip Kazimir, paintings of both sacred and secular content were also acquired.

In the 19th century, portraits of family members were commissioned by eminent Austrian and Hungarian painters (J.G. Donat, Franz Schrotzberg, Anton Einsle). At that time, a series of four nudes (Europe, Asia, Africa, America) was also commissioned, created by the Slovenian painter Mihael Stroy. During the time of Ivan IX (1844-1910) and his wife Julijana, née Erdödy (1847-1901), who was a painter, the castle was enriched with a series of her original works and excellent copies of paintings from the Liechtenstein Collection at the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna, as well as works by painters close to her (J. Till, H. Girardet, I. K. Aiwasoffskij).

The few prints currently preserved in the collection today are decorative in nature, with a Piranesi print being particularly noteworthy among them.