NIKOLIĆ Božidar Božo

(Banja Luka, Bosnia and Herzegovina, 1904 – Banja Luka, Bosnia and Herzegovina, 1958)

He finished studying painting at the School of Arts in Belgrade in 1929. After graduating, he worked as a teacher of drawing in Bihać (1929). A year later, he returned to Banja Luka, where he got a job as a teacher of drawing in the High School.

Božo Nikolić belongs to the generation of our artists between the two world wars. His work consists of oil paintings, watercolor, tempera and pencil drawings. He sought the inspiration in his environment, so most common motives of his work include people, still life and landscapes. Although his artistic development passed through several stages, he remains on the border between realism and impressionism. In the catalog of the retrospective exhibition at the Museum of the Republika Srpska in 2009, Slavka Mirosavljević, author of the exhibition, described Nikolić as a realist by nature, and an impressionist by his understanding of art.

From 1951 to 1953 he worked as a professor at the College of Education in Banja Luka. For many years he was the director of the Museum of the Bosnian Krajina (now the Museum of the Republika Srpska).