Gračanica Monastery

The painting belongs to the War period of Nadežda's work, when in the background of cruel war events, paintings of indescribable beauty and high artistic value are created. The motifs of the paintings of the war period do not directly touch on the events of the war, but, suppressing the scenes of war horrors, the paintings depict the beauty of Serbian landscapes and the architectural sublimity of medieval monasteries. Just before the end of the First Balkan War in the late spring of 1913, Nadežda paid special attention to the field of Kosovo and the Church of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin in the monastery of Gračanica. Carried away by the architectural beauty of King Milutin's endowment from the beginning of the 14th century, raised by the national pathos and tragedy of the moment, emphasizing the coloristic liveliness and dynamics of the slender five-domed building, she created a masterpiece of Serbian expressionism.