biography

Vesna Jovanovic is a contemporary visual artist whose work ranges from surreal drawings to pinhole photographs and double-walled ceramic vessels. Her creative process often involves a combination of chance and precision, reflecting interests in time, science, and the unity of opposites. Jovanovic holds a B.A. degree in Fine Arts and a B.S. degree in Chemistry from Loyola University Chicago, where she received a Mellon Award, First Place, for her Senior Exhibit. She also holds a B.F.A. in Studio Art from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago, where she was granted a Merit Scholarship of Recognition. Her M.F.A. degree in Photography is from The Ohio State University. Jovanovic is a recipient of the 2006 Drench Award in Illustration and the 2007 Chicago CAAP grant. She was selected as a Curator's Choice Artist at the 2007 Chicago Art Open. Her artwork has been exhibited at many venues, including the Columbus Museum of Art in Columbus, OH, Soho Photo Gallery in New York, and Primo Piano Gallery in Lecce, Italy. She currently teaches in the Chicago area.

early background

Vesna Jovanovic was born in 1976 to a Serbian-American family in Chicago, IL, where she displayed an interest in art at an early age. In 1984, she won Second Place in a National Career Poster Contest that was sponsored by the National Vocational Guidance Association. Due to her rapidly declining health, that same year her family relocated to the small Mediterranean town of Igalo, Montenegro (former Yugoslavia). The town is on the shore of the Adriatic Sea, near the tri-border of Montenegro, Croatia and Bosnia-Hercegovina, and it is known for its healing properties. The environment and Yugoslavian doctors improved Jovanovic's health, but the political and economic state of the country worsened year by year. Seven years later, in 1991, battles broke out just outside of town and her family abruptly moved back to Chicago. While re-learning the English language, Jovanovic enrolled in a Chicago Public High School and then proceeded to pursue an academic career in Art and Chemistry, eventually focusing on the Visual Arts.