150 Years since the Birth of Spiro Bocaric
Title: 150 Years since the Birth of Spiro Bocaric
Date of Issue: 21.05.2026.
Author: Nebojsa Djumic
Type edition: commemorative
Printing techniques: multicolour offset
Sheet: 8+1
Paper: muflep 100g
Printing House: Blicdruk, Sarajevo
Motive: Spiro Bocaric
Catalogue no.: 1020
Perforation: 13 3/4
Face value: 1.20 BAM
Тираж: 7 000
Spiridon Spiro Bocaric was born on May 24, 1876 in Budva, and Banja Luka was the place of his long life and work. Spiro acquired his first knowledge and charms of the painting craft from his older brother Anastas, also a painter.
He studied in Venice, where he perfected a special artistic technique, pointillism, which would mark him as a painter.
After school, he spent a short time in Novi Sad, later joining his brother Anastas in Mostar, and then his journey took him to Sarajevo. By then, he had already become a recognized artist, the founder of civic painting in Bosnia and Herzegovina. In the Sarajevo bazaar, Spiro met the cream of the social elite of the time, especially Petar Kocic, whom he later encouraged and supported in his national work as a close friend. Due to his frequent association with this Serbian tribune, he was exiled to Banja Luka, where he spent an artistic and socially significant period of his life.
In 1930, in order to meet the needs of the growing bourgeois class, Svetislav Tisa Milosavljevic, the Ban of the Vrbas Banovina, decided to establish the Museum of the Vrbas Banovina, whose first director was Spiro Bocaric. He saw his appointment to this position as a great opportunity to improve the cultural scene of the entire Bosnian Krajina. For 11 years, Bocaric was extremely dedicated to collecting museum materials of inestimable value. The museum was then enriched with a large number of specimens of various weapons, richly woven folk costumes, embroideries and tapestries, numerous other items related to numismatics and ornamentation, and he himself donated a large number of his artistic paintings.
Particularly interesting are his studies of the natural beauty, landscapes and ethnography of the Vrbas Banovina, which resulted in the creation of the first tourist guide to the Vrbas Banovina, then in the filming of the documentary film "Cities and Landscapes of the Vrbas Banovina" and the significant ethnographic work "Ornament of the Vrbas Banovina".
Unfortunately, this prolific artist, who could have given much more to his people and state, ended his life very tragically. After the occupation of Banja Luka, he was arrested and taken to the Jadovno camp...
Author: Nebojsa Djumic
Publisher: Poste Srpske a.d. Banjaluka
Cooperation: Museum of Republic of Srpska, Slavka Mirosavljevic - art historian, Rotary Club, Zoran Pejasinovic - historian