Ksenija Vujović Tošić

— born in Trieste in 1930, she completed her secondary education in Cetinje before enrolling at the Academy of Fine Arts in Ljubljana, where she graduated in 1953. She specialized in painting under Professor Franc Mihelič in 1955. In Slovenia (Mengeš, Ljubljana), she worked as a teaching assistant in art education for two years. Upon returning to Montenegro, she worked as a painter-decorator at Lovćen Film in Budva and as an assistant to painter Anton Lukateli. She became a member of the Association of Fine Artists of Montenegro in 1956. She dedicated herself to teaching as a professor of visual culture at the Technical School Center from 1974. A recipient of the prestigious Prešeren Award in 1954 and the 13. November Award at the Cetinje Salon of Yugoslav Fine Art (1967, 1974), she studied in Paris as a scholarship holder of the Council for the Advancement of the Arts (Moša Pijade) in 1958. She exhibited widely in solo and group shows domestically and internationally, including Cetinje, Nikšić, Titograd, Romania, the USSR, Italy, Belgium, France, Denmark, Egypt, Tunisia, Cyprus, Turkey, Bulgaria, Norway, Austria, and Germany. She passed away in Podgorica in 1999.

Ksenija Vujović-Tošić was the first academically trained female painter in Montenegro. From childhood, she was immersed in art, as her parents were both artists: her mother, Danijela Gruden, an academic painter from Trieste, and her father, Savo Vujović, a renowned Montenegrin painter, graphic artist, and scenographer, one of the founders of the Association of Fine Artists of Montenegro in 1946 and a professor at the Art School in Cetinje and later Herceg Novi.

“I strive not to imitate anyone, no matter how great they are. Even my father has not influenced me. He paints very differently than I do. He did not influence me even as a child, and the best proof is that I ended up studying painting entirely by chance.”

Ksenija’s oeuvre primarily comprises paintings, though she also worked in printmaking, illustration, and scenography. Her first prints were created to illustrate the catalog for the celebration of 13 July 1948 in Titograd. Her early graphic works were published in Slovenian press and the Montenegrin newspaper Pobjeda.

After returning to Montenegro, Ksenija joined the Association of Fine Artists of Montenegro in 1956 and exhibited in nearly all its shows. Early in her career, her work gained recognition, earning her the Moša Pijade scholarship for studies in Paris. Additionally, as a young artist in her first year of specialized studies, she won the esteemed Prešeren Award. Despite this, she was deemed “overqualified for teaching roles” in Montenegro and spent over a decade unemployed.

“I am willing to make sacrifices for painting. One of them is sleep. As a homemaker and mother, I have little time left for painting. I pick up my palette only in the evening. Sometimes I work through the night. But you cannot make a living from painting. The income from sold works hasn’t even covered material costs. That is another sacrifice.”

Ksenija initially painted in oil on canvas but increasingly turned to pastels due to limited workspace. “When I paint, I set up my easel and oils in the kitchen, spreading brushes and materials across the counters. Oils require space to view the work properly, which I lack. That’s why I gravitate toward pastels—they demand less room.”

Color dominated her works, applied thickly with broad, gestural brushstrokes using brushes or palette knives. Her restrained palette focused on tonal gradations and valer, occasionally reinforced by dark contours to stabilize compositions. Her intimate, quotidian subjects include landscapes of the Cijevna River, still lifes, and frequent portraits of women and children.

“I love portraits. I love observing what lies within a figure—the visible and the hidden.”

As a freelance artist, she advocated for better conditions for artists, particularly through her long-term role as secretary of the Association of Fine Artists of Montenegro. Committed to pedagogy, she taught at secondary schools and often emphasized her passion for working with youth.

“I lived actively, worked hard. My life was beautiful, full. Everything contributed to this: painting, family, friends, and my students, whom I still miss in retirement. Of course, my travels to Paris, Venice, Padua, Germany, Belgium, Denmark—seeing the works of Post-Impressionists I admired, like Van Gogh and Gauguin… My only regret is that I did not paint even more.”

1Image: Ksenija Vujović-Tošić, A Woman with the Fish, 1965, Oil on canvas, 805x645cm. Courtesy of the artist and the National Museum of Montenegro.

2Image: Ksenija Vujović-Tošić, Self-Portrait, Oil on canvas, 1015x68cm. Courtesy of the artist and the National Museum of Montenegro.

3Image: Ksenija Vujović-Tošić, The Fish in the Net, Oil on canvas, 545x64cm. Courtesy of the artist and the National Museum of Montenegro.

4Image: Ksenija Vujović-Tošić, A Courtyard, Oil on canvas, 68x82cm. Courtesy of the artist and the PI Museums and Galleries of Podgorica.