Ilija Bašičević Bosilj (1895-1972)
Ilija Bašičević Bosilj is one of the most famous Serbian naive painters. Bosilj interweaves the personal drama and intuitive reaches with a new approach to creativity and art in general, which marks the naive painting and set s a completely new standards for it. Most of naive painters reflect social problems, predominantly within rural life and the environment that surrounds it in a sublime simplicity, while Bosilj leads us in his inner world. London magazine Raw Vision declares him to be one of fifty classic art brut painters.
He was a farmer until the age of 62 when he began to paint. He made his first gouaches and drawings in 1957. and started painting with oil colors in 1958. His works were included in the naive exhibitions of Yugoslavia in 1957. During his lifetime, he exhibited all over Europe, Japan and South America. In 2006 he had a solo exhibition in New York’s Gallerie St. Etienne.
He left a large part of his collection in Šid, with the desire to open a naive art museum – the museum Ilianum. The “Ilianum” was officially opened in 1970.