Bosnian painter Nada Rudan marked her 100th birthday in 2022 with an exhibition in Sarajevo, 13 years after beginning to paint.
Rudan discovered the practice at the age of 87 as a way of remaining active and curious.
A disciplined late beginning
At home, she painted for around three hours each morning and another two hours in the afternoon. Acrylic was her preferred medium because it allowed her to work without strong odours.
Nature appeared frequently in the approximately 200 paintings surrounding her Sarajevo home. Journeys with her children and grandchildren also provided subjects, including a Hawaiian volcano and Mexican pyramids.
Rudan had travelled widely after the death of her husband in 1999, visiting the United States, Central America and several European countries.
Painting after a lifetime of work
Before turning to art, Rudan had made her living as a dressmaker and continued working for selected clients until the age of 85.
She described herself as an amateur rather than a professional artist, but took pride in seeing family, friends and neighbours attend the exhibition.
Her long life had included the Second World War and the siege of Sarajevo from 1992 to 1995. Painting did not erase those experiences, but became part of a broader determination to remain independent and engaged.
The exhibition’s significance lay in the time scale behind it. Rudan’s artistic practice was neither a childhood ambition finally rewarded nor a brief novelty. It developed through sustained daily work begun in her late eighties and made public at the age of 100.