NUS-Commissioned Delia Prvački Artwork

Title: Odyssey (2005)

Location: University Hall, NUS
Medium: Ceramics
Dimensions: 16500 x 1780 cm

Commissioned to celebrate NUS’s centennial, the mural is sized at over 100 square meters, realised in glazed stoneware and is one of Delia’s largest ceramic murals. The art piece seeks to convey itself as an interpretation of the perpetual journey followed by the eternal return to home, the process of maturation through sacrifices, struggle and aspiration. Find out more.

Visit the artwork at 21 Lower Kent Ridge Rd, Singapore 119077.

Raku Workshop with NUS Museum

NUS students, staff & members of the public spent 8 sessions at the artist’s studio to learn raku firing techniques.
 

Donated Delia Prvački Artworks to NUS

#1 Title: Butterfly (2006)

Location: UCC Green
Donor: Delia Prvacki, 2012
Medium: Stoneware slab, cast in GRC, metallic subframe
Dimensions: 250 x 97 x 25 cm

#2 Title: Rosary (2007)

Location: UCC Green
Donor: Delia Prvacki, 2012
Medium: Stoneware slab, cast in GRC, metallic subframe
Dimensions: 200 x 100 x 10 cm

#3 Title: Necklace (2007)

Location: UCC Green
Donor: Delia Prvacki, 2012
Medium: Stoneware slab, cast in GRC, metallic subframe
Dimensions: 40 x 100 x 90 cm

#4 Title: Poetry, Dance, Day in the city, Music, Night (2000)

Location: Alice Lee Plaza, NUS Museum
Donor: Fairmont Singapore, 2014
Medium: Stoneware, stains, oxide and gold
Dimensions: Variable

First commissioned for the Raffles The Plaza hotel, these sculptures found their way to NUS when the hotel, currently known as Fairmont Singapore, decided on a change in their interior design. Find out more.

#5 Title: A Piece of Sky, No. 7 (1999)

Donor: Delia Prvacki, 2014
Medium: GRC, blue pigment, wires, 1976 platinum glazed porcelain stars & 24 golden stars
Dimensions: 240 x 250 x 80 cm

This piece was commissioned to celebrate the Millenium, year 2000, first displayed at Sculpture Square. The donation to NUS had named Delia a Friend at the Patron of Heritage Awards in 2014. Find out more.

#6 Title: Picnic in the Garden (2006)

Location: UTown Green
NUS Donor: Delia Prvacki, 2023
Medium: Hand-made ceramic tiles and elements, glazed, cast in GRC with a metallic subframe
Dimensions: 29 x 250 x 97 cm

First displayed at Fort Caning in 2006, Picnic in the Garden is inspired by Édouard Manet’s Le déjeuner sur l’herbe (The Luncheon on the Grass) and invites viewers to picnic and reflect on their position in nature within an urbanised environment.

Before relocating to NUS UTown Green, preventative measures were done to better protect the artwork from outdoor elements.  A novel mixed-design material developed by NUS Centre for Advanced 2D Materials (CA2DM) is applied at the bottom of the artwork to shield it from water and chemical exposure using nanotechnology. The installation for this artwork is a demonstration of NUS’s interdisciplinary approach in which the curator, artist, conservator, material scientists, engineers and students, work together to tend to the multiple needs of the sculpture, from transportation, to care and conservation.

Find out more here, or visit the artwork at 2 College Ave West, Singapore 138607.

Materiality – Investigative Approach on Experimental Technology, Ceramic Making and Artistic Practice
Ongoing exhibition at NUS Museum’s Archaeology Library
Collaborators: NUS Museum, Institute for Functional Intelligent Materials (I-FIM)

Gallery impression of exhibition, Materiality at NUS Museum’s Archaeology Library

Sculptural studies inspired from the perception of seeing ceramic as a tangible (macro) object and with the aid of scanning electron microscope (SEM) technology

The National University of Singapore (NUS) established a public art policy in 2021 to integrate art into the campus, enhancing spaces and fostering community pride. The inaugural Artist-in-Residence (AiR) commission, “Materiality – Investigative Approach on Experimental Technology, Ceramic Making and Artistic Practice”, is part of the NUS Public Art Initiative.

This exhibition features collaborations among artist Delia Prvački, physicist Professor Kostya Novoselov, Associate Professor Daria Andreeva-Baeumler, graduate student Wu Jiqiang, and curator Karen Lim. Positioned at the Lee Kong Chian Gallery, it connects art history, conservation, and material science, offering new insights and fostering interdisciplinary research. Find out more.

Click here to view the exhibition brochure.

• • Born in Baia Mare, Romania

Delia Prvački and her siblings

• Started working and making ceramics at the local factories, including a tableware factory, every summer till 1973
• Her siblings would join her whenever they had time

• Read American poet, Walt Whitman’s poem, Leaves of Grass (1855)
• Published her own poetry and illustrations
• Wrote articles for the local newspaper

• Played the violin as a piano accompaniment at a local music school in Baia Mare

• First solo show at the Planetarium in Baia Mare

• Moved to Bucharest, Romania for further education at the Bucharest Institute of Fine Arts, where she met her husband, Milenko Prvački
• While at Bucharest, Delia worked as a backstage assistant for a film

• • Graduated from the Bucharest Institute of Fine Arts with a Master of Arts in Applied Arts/Ceramics

• Delia married Milenko Prvački
• Moved to Belgrade (former Yugoslavia). 

• Ana Prvački (Delia’s daughter) was born.

• Started career as a full-time professional artist in former Yugoslavia

• Death of Josep Broz Tito, President of Yugoslavia at that time

• Member of the Yugoslav Association of Applied Art Professional Practitioners

• Exhibition – keramoplastika at Meduza Koper Gallery, Slovenia. In the catalogue for this exhibition, Delia wrote a poem titled, De Rerum Natura, which recorded the impetus of her artistic practice. The title of this show, “keramoplastika,” is a ceramics genre that is heavily influenced by sculptural techniques

• Exhibition – De Rerum Natura at Museum of Decorative Arts Belgrade, former Yugoslavia

• Exhibition – The Danube at Stara Kapetanija Gallery, Zemun, Serbia

• Start of civil war in Yugoslavia

• Migrated to Singapore with her daughter Ana Prvački, following her husband

• First Exhibition in Singapore, Delia & Milenko Prvački at Cultural Art Gallery, LaSalle College of Art. Delia and Milenko have collaborated on numerous projects over the years and continue to do so to this day.

• Founded and registered art consultancy Deliarts Pte Ltd. 
• City Life mural series at Suntec City, commissioned by Suntec City Development P L. First public art commission in Singapore. The artwork is no longer at Suntec City. Delia has since completed several public art commissions.  

Two of four City Life murals, 1995 at Suntec City.

• Exhibition – Celebration at Sculpture Square, Singapore – Delia’s first solo exhibition in Singapore.
• On January 30th, 2000, the dam holding toxic waste from the Baia Mare Aurul gold mine in Northwestern Romania failed, discharging 100,000 cubic meters of cyanide-laden wastewater into the Lapus and Somes tributaries of the Tisza River, one of Hungary’s largest rivers. Read more.
  

Gallery view of the exhibition Celebration, 2000 at Sculpture Square.

• Became a Singapore citizen

• Interchange, Dhoby Ghaut MRT
• Created in collaboration with Delia’s husband, Milenko Prvački, this artwork symbolise the intersection of the station lines that pass through Dhoby Ghaut. The combination of ceramic and mosaic elements that cover walls, climb columns, and extend across the station floor, reflect the cultural diversity and artistic heritage of Singapore and the region, as well as the concept of constant movement.

Ceramic assemblage component of the artwork, Interchange at Dhoby Ghaut MRT Station. The artwork includes another wall face adjacent to the one in the picture and the floor and pillar near it.

• Delia later created another ceramic mural, Singapore Tapestry, 2015 for Marina South Pier MRT Station. Learn more about LTA’s Art in Transit program.

• Exhibition – Compass at Piran Obaline Galerie, Slovenia
• Exhibition – Silk Road at A+A Gallery, Venice, Italy
• Delia continues to exhibit in Europe throughout her career while being based in Singapore

Delia working on Silk Road, 2007 at A+A Gallery in Venice, Italy.

Delia pictured with Necklace, 2007 and Rosary, 2007 at Piran Obaline Galerie in Slovenia. The two floor pieces are currently at the University Cultural Centre near the NUS Museum, donated by the artist.

• Exhibition – MINE at Sculpture Square. This exhibition marks the start of her mining series exhibitions, which include Rare Earths at Combiart (her studio) in 2014, and MINE II at Substation in 2017.  

• Exhibition – Construction Site at Concourse, Esplanade (with Milenko). 

View of installation, Construction Site, at Concourse, Esplanade.

• COVID-19 Pandemic
• Big Hug, Children’s Biennale at National Gallery Singapore (with Milenko). For this commission, Delia made interactive elements for a multi-room installation. Read more.

Image of interactive ceramic artwork for the Children’s Biennale in 2019.

• Cornucopia – of abundance and giving at Earl Lu Gallery, Lasalle College of the Arts. First exhibition since COVID-19 Pandemic.