Last week, our associate, Dr. Ivana Lemcool, gave a lecture at Stanford University. The lecture titled "Making Sacred Spaces Virtual: The Role of Digital Tools in Preservation and Demarginalization of Ecclesiastical Art of Southeastern Europe" was held within the "Global Approaches to Sacred Space" Workshop organized by Prof. Bissera...
We have published the collection of Monastery Koporin. The collection includes over a thousand pictures taken during our visits to the monastery in June of 2024. It is situated near the town of Velika Plana, in the valley of the Koporin River. The church presently dedicated to Saint Stephen (originally to Holy Archangels) is an endowment of an unkn...
After two field trips in 2021 and 2023 and extensive post-processing work, we have published the collection of Monastery Grachanica. The collection includes over five thousand pictures out of the fifteen thousand taken during our visits to the monastery. The panorama movie walk offers a unique view of the monastery church interior, showcasing the s...
The Sisojevac Monastery, located at the source of the Crnica River near Ćuprije and close to the Ravanica Monastery, has a rich history. Its origins are linked to the priest Sisoj, mentioned in a charter by Princess Milica from 1398 when she was known as nun Evgenija. It is believed that the monastery church of the Transfiguration was built during ...
The BLAGO Fund-sponsored session took place at the International Medieval Congress in Leeds, UK. The Congress organized by the Institute for Medieval Studies at the University of Leeds is Europe's largest annual gathering of medievalists worldwide. This year's thematic focus of the Congress was 'Crisis', and it was attended by approx...
Our new collection of the Naupara monastery is available on our website. The church was built, most probably, in the 1370s, modeled after the palatial church of Prince Lazar in nearby Kruševac. It has a trefoil plan, with a dome above its central area and a bell tower above the narthex. In addition to sculptural decoration which is characteristic o...
Our new collection of the Rudenica monastery is available on our website. Last summer, we visited this exceptional monument of the Morava school of architecture, foundation of nobleman Vukašin and his wife Vukosava. Their portraits have been preserved in the nave of the church, alongside the portraits of Despot Stefan Lazarević and his b...
Our new collection of the Monastery of Ljubostinja is available on our website. This summer, we visited this beautiful late 14th-century foundation of Princess Milica in Central Serbia, and after completing our work on editing and organizing the material we created, we have posted hundreds of high-quality photographs along with the VR tour of the C...
We are extremely saddened by losing our dear friend and colleague, Operation Director and BOD President of BLAGO Serbia, Ljubomir Medenica. Meda, as he was known to most of his friends and associates, has been a part of our organization since its inception. His background as an electrical engineer, technical knowledge and practical mindset, and org...
A new collection of the Budisavci Monastery is posted on our website. This summer, we visited the small female monastic community living in this 14th-century foundation that is 17 km away from the Patriarchate of Peć. The church of Holy Transfiguration preserves 16th-century painting that was made owing to the efforts of Makarije Sok...
We are excited to announce that we are preparing a BLAGO Fund-sponsored session for the next International Medieval Congress in Leeds, 1-4 July 2024. Crisis, Accessibility, and Preservation:Digitizing Medieval Heritage in a Changing World ___ BLAGO Fund Sponsored Session The current global crises, such as climate change, political instabilit...
Besides Kosovo and Metohija, this year's field trip included central Serbia, more precisely, the area surrounding the city of Kruševac. With the blessing of His Grace Bishop David, our small team made complete collections of the Monasteries Ljubostinja, Rudenica, Naupare, and Drenča. Ljubostinja Monastery is an Orthodox monastery near the town of T...
On Friday, May 26, 2023, our BLAGO Fund team set out on a journey from Belgrade to Gračanica to photograph the Serbian medieval cultural heritage of Gračanica and Budisavci monasteries, as well as the churches in Lipljan and Crkolez. Three-member team left Belgrade in a rented van and arrived in Jagodina, where other team members joined them. ...
The collection of Monastery Pavlica is available on the BLAGO website. The monastery is located in the gorge of the river Ibar and close to the 11th-century church of Stara (Old) Pavlica and the medieval fortification of Brvenik. It is an endowment of the Musić family related to Prince Lazar Hrebeljanović. The BLAGO team visited the monastery ...
On the evening of 23 May, in the crypt of the Church of Saint Sava in Belgrade, the book launch of our publication "Full of Grace: Representations of the Mother of God in Serbian Medieval Wall Painting" took place. Their Graces Bishops Maksim and Grigorije talked about the Mother of God and her relevance in the history of salvation and our dai...
We have recently uploaded a fresh assortment of images from the Gradac Monastery on our website. Our team had the pleasure of revisiting this exceptional example of medieval Serbian art, and we have captured stunning new photographs at a higher resolution, along with drone footage showcasing a panoramic view of the monastery grounds. Moreover, we h...
From 21 December 2022 until 23 February 2023, the exhibition "Gračanica: The Brilliance of Art in the Age of King Milutin," authored by Aleksandra Davidov Temerinski, was on view at the Gallery of Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts in Belgrade. Over 22 000 people visited the exhibition, realized in cooperation between the SASA and the R...
2022 was a very productive year for the BLAGO fund. The following accomplishments only partially represent our continued work collecting and publishing Serbian heritage. We have published seven new collections, including Monastery Kalenić, Monastery Jošanica, the church in Crkolez, the churches of Sredačka and Sirinićka župa, and the church in Rama...
The first printed edition of BLAGO Fund, "Full of Grace: Representations of the Mother of God in Serbian Medieval Wall Painting," published by Laguna Press, is now available in select bookstores. The book features texts in English and Serbian by His Grace Bishop Dr. Maxim (Vasiljević), art historian Dr. Ivana Lemcool, a foreword by His Gr...
A new collection is available on our website. The Church of Saint John the Forerunner in the village of Crkolez in Metohija is first mentioned in a charter issued in 1400 by Princess Milica with her sons. Since the charter confirms the boundaries and privileges established at the time of Emperor Dušan, the church must have been built before hi...