Tošo Dabac

Tošo Dabac (; 18 May 1907 – 9 May 1970) was a Croatian photographer of international renown. Although his work was often exhibited and prized abroad, Dabac spent nearly his entire working career in Zagreb. After he dropped out of law school in 1927, he became the editor of Metro Megafon magazine.

After World War II, Dabac joined the Croatian Association of Visual Artists (Croatian: Udruženje likovnih umjetnika Hrvatske or ULUH). In 1945, he spent a month shooting photographs around Istria while writing a diary which depicts the post-war state of the region. In 1946 he continued to shoot natural wonders and cultural heritage sites along the Dalmatian coast from Istria to Dubrovnik.

In the following years Dabac regularly contributed to Jugoslavija magazine and made a series of photographs of medieval sculptures and frescos, tourist sites and Dubrovnik summer houses. He was also hired to work as a photographer at many exhibitions and trade fairs where Yugoslav companies participated (in Toronto in 1949, in Chicago in 1950, in Moscow in 1958 and at the 1958 Expo in Brussels). In 1952, his works were shown at an international exhibition in Lucerne, along with others such as Richard Avedon, Cecil Beaton, Henri Cartier-Bresson, Robert Frank and André Kertész.

Later life

In 1960, Dabac exhibited at an international exhibition that has since gained cult status, Das menschliche Antlitz Europas, along with Robert Capa, Werner Bischof, Edward Steichen and others. In 1965, his work was shown at Karl Pawek's exhibition titled Was ist der Mensch?. In 1966, he was awarded the Vladimir Nazor Award, given by the Croatian Ministry of Culture for highest achievements in visual arts, for his photographs of the stećak tombstones. Later that year, he won the annual award and the life achievement diploma by the Yugoslav Photographic Union (Fotosavez Jugoslavije). In 1967, Dabac started mentoring Marija Braut.

Dabac worked for many international publishing houses, including Thames & Hudson, Encyclopædia Britannica, Alber Müller Verlag of Zürich, Hanns Reich Verlag of Munich, and others. His photographs were used in both local and foreign encyclopedias. He also wrote and collaborated on many books of photographs of cities and regions throughout Croatia and Yugoslavia. Dabac was a member of several national and international photographic organisations; from 1953 he was a member of the Photographic Society of America and he was made an honorary member of the Royal Photographic Society of Belgium (CREPSA), the Dutch salon FOKUS, and the holder of titles Hon. exc. by FIAP and MS (Master of Photography) by the Yugoslav Photographic Union.

Legacy Tošo Dabac died on 9 May 1970 in Zagreb and was buried at Mirogoj Cemetery.

In 1975, the Zagreb Photographic Club established an annual award given to Croatian photographers for highest achievements in the field.

Dabac's entire photographic opus of nearly 200,000 negatives is kept in the Tošo Dabac Archive, at his former studio. In March 2006, the archive was acquired by the City of Zagreb and is now managed by the Museum of Contemporary Art.

Selected exhibitions

Group 1933 – "Second Philadelphia International Salon of Photography", Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia, USA 1937 – "Fourth International Salon"", American Museum of Natural History, New York, USA 1937 – "Invitational Salon of International Photography", San Francisco Museum of Art, San Francisco, USA 1937 – "Sixth International Salon", Boston Camera Club, Boston, USA 1939 – "Sixth International Salon of Photography, Centennial Exhibition ", American Museum of Natural History, New York, USA 1951 – "Mostra della Fotografia Europea", Palazzo di Brera, Milan, Italy 1952 – "Welt Ausstellung der Photographie", Lucerne, Switzerland 1960 – "International Salon of Photography Das menschliche Antlitz Europas", Munich, West Germany 1965 – "Welt Ausstellung der Photographie, Was ist der Mensch?", Hamburg, West Germany 1968 – "Tombstones of medieval Bosnia", National Gallery in Prague, Belvedere Palace, Prague, Czechoslovakia

Solo 1962 – "Salon of Photography", Belgrade, Yugoslavia 1968 – "Tošo Dabac Retrospective", Museum of Arts and Crafts, Zagreb, Yugoslavia 1969 – "The Art of the Stećak", Art Pavilion, Zagreb, Yugoslavia 1969 – "The Days of Yugoslavia", Ingelheim am Rhein, Germany 1969 – Split Art Gallery, Split, Yugoslavia 1972 – "Tošo Dabac und sein Atelier", Kunstverein Mannheim (Mannheim Society of Art), Mannheim, West Germany 1975 – "Mostra fotografica ad invito: I grandi autori FIAP", Padua, Italy 1984 – "Fotografie di Tošo Dabac", Centro San Fedele, Milan, Italy 1988 – "Color photographs by Tošo Dabac 1940–1941", Studio Fotocolor, Zagreb, Yugoslavia 1992 – "Mois de la Photo Mitteleuropa Tošo Dabac: une oeuvre de transition", Grande halle de la Villette, Paris, France 1994 – "1930s Zagreb", Museum of Contemporary Art, Zagreb, Croatia 2002 – "The Photographer Tošo Dabac", Klovićevi dvori Gallery, Zagreb, Croatia