From our collections: Milan Butina, set designer, temporary exhibition

The exhibition From Our Collections: Milan Butina, Set Designer is part of the celebrations marking the 100th anniversary of the artist's birth. In Kočevje, his birthplace, the year 2023 has been declared the Milan Butina Cultural Theme Year. The Kočevje Regional Museum has organised the exhibition Hommage to Milan Butina in the Kočevje Fine Arts Salon, and the artist's jubilee is being marked by two exhibitions at the Slovenian Theatre Institute - Theatre Museum, the Stanet Kregar Gallery (in the St Stanislav Institute in Šentvid) and the Hest Gallery in Maribor, in addition to the Slovenian Theatre Institute - Theatre Museum.

The exhibition From Our Collections: Milan Butina, Set Designer at the Slovenian Theatre Institute - Theatre Museum focuses on the artist's oeuvre as a set designer. It will present a selection of sketches from the period between 1951 and 1967, representing scenographic designs for twenty-four productions - seventeen were staged at the Ljubljana City Theatre, one each in Celje, Trieste and Kranj, four remained unrealised. A selection of sketches is kept in our iconotheque collection - the enrichment of the collection is largely due to Mrs Darja Butina, the artist's daughter, who donated Butina's scenographic sketches, a model, portraits of the creators and backstage sketches to SLOGI.

Milan Butina (21 November 1923, Kočevje - 24 June 1999, Ljubljana) is considered the founder of art theory in Slovenia. However, Milan Butina was not "only" a painter and art theorist, but also a theatre man. As a painter and set designer, he joined the Ljubljana City Theatre in 1950, where he was later employed as technical manager from 1962 to 1967. As a set designer (and often also costume designer) he co-created more than ninety productions, not only at the Ljubljana City Theatre, but also at the Ljubljana Youth Theatre, the Slovenian National Theatre in Trieste, the Drama Theatre of the Slovene National Theatre in Maribor, the Celje City Theatre, the Prešeren Theatre in Kranj, the Ljubljana City Puppet Theatre and the Opera Theatre of the Slovene National Theatre in Ljubljana. He has participated with scenographic drafts in the triennials of theatre scenography and costume design at the Steri Attention in Novi Sad and at the Prague Quadrennial of Scenic Design and Space in the Czech Republic, in the Czech Republic.


Exhibition colophon
Exhibition From our collections: Milan Butina, set designer
Production: Slovenian Theatre Institute
Author and curator: Tea Rogelj
Digitisation and graphic design: Dana Kodermac
Technical design: Andrej Ovsec
Pedagogical programmes: Sandra Jenko
Proofreading: Andraž Polončič Ruparčič