On Monday, December 15th, 2014, an exhibition of illustrations by Dagmar Franolić was opened at the Decumanus Gallery in Krk, alongside a presentation of two illustrated collections of Russian fairy tales: Up to the Knees in Gold, Up to the Elbows in Silver and The Flying Rug.
The books Up to the Knees in Gold, Up to the Elbows in Silver and The Flying Rug were recently published by the publishing house eskadrila, led and founded by Igor Duraković. The books were illustrated by Dagmar Franolić, while the graphic design of the books is signed by Lena Franolić. The fairy tales were translated from Russian by Slađana Domladovac and Zdenka Vukadin, and reviewed by dr.sc. Danijela Lugaric Vukas.
Since many of the 26 fairy tales that constitute this two-part collection have never been available to Croatian readers translated, they should attract the attention not only of younger readers but also of scholars dealing with literature, folklore, ethnology and comparative history of cultures.
Mirjana Komadina Mergl, Igor Duraković, Dagmar Franolić and Igor Gržetić spoke at the opening, while the evening was moderated by Maja Parentić.
Igor Duraković stated that he hired Dagmar Franolić to illustrate the book, since he followed her work for twenty years, and that for him Dagmar’s paintings are like a window into a wast fairy-tale world, so the choice was more than logical.
Dagmar Franolić reveals us how illustration has always attracted her and how she has seen this task as a great and important challenge to create something fairy-tale and close to her sensibility, while still something new and different to her. After almost a year of working on the illustrations, each story got its own illustration and even more, but her perception of how the book might end up looking when it’s finished was still very vague. Hence, the graphic design, layout and typography of the book were done by her daughter Lena Franolić, which further encouraged Dagmar because she saw that her illustrations were in good hands.
The exhibition of illustrations by Dagmar Franolić that accompanies this presentation will be open until December 24th, 2014, every working day from 10:00 to 13:00.
For more information about the opening please read the article Enter the Wonderful World of Russian Fairy Tales on the web pages of The City of Krk.
Here you can take a look at other illustrations from Dagmar’s portfolio of Rusian Fairytales.
