Museum of Naive Art - Ilijanum

Ilija Bosilj donated 338 works of art to Shida for the establishment of the museum, of which 287 are his works. The remaining number consists of works by great Serbian and Yugoslav naives such as Ivan Generalić, Josip Generalić, Emerik Feješ, Vangel Naumovski, Ivan Rabuzin, etc.

The yard of the museum is painted with motifs from the paintings of Ilija Bosilj and represents an indispensable summer "stage" for various cultural events.

According to the donor's request, the museum is located in the house of the Jewish family Winterstein, which perished in the Holocaust, and which is located next to the building of the Art Gallery "Sava Shumanović" Sid.

The permanent exhibition in the museum always consists of between 40 and 50 works of art, mostly by Ilija Bosilj, and then by the other mentioned naïves. The aim of the exhibition is to present the work of the donor by exhibiting his most significant works from all cycles (Iliјada, Birds, Beasts, Bible, etc.).

The cycle „Birds“ includes 56 paintings. Vladimir Crnković wrote about Ilija's birds: "... The wingedness not only testifies to the possibility of taking off from the earth, but also to the transformation of the material into the spiritual, in other words, it indicates sublimation.

The bird has long been a symbol of the heavenly, the spiritual, as well as the soul, so it can be interpreted as a metaphor for spiritualization, the transformation of the physical into the spiritual - which is one of the most common preoccupations in Ilija's work.“

These paintings belong to the cycle "Bible". Ilija Bosilj painted a whole series of works with motifs from the Bible, both the Old and New Testaments, and especially the Apocalypse (Revelation of John). 

Angels are most often painted in the paintings. But also scenes from the Bible, such as the Adoration of the Wisemen from the East shown in the picture below.

Although the picture shows a bird - a peacock, it belongs to the Iliјadа cycle. The Iliјadа cycle contains 35 works. Some authors believe that in this cycle, Ilija mocks and mocks his neighbors from the street, presenting them with dog's heads, as they show off on the street full of themselves, arrogant for no reason. Other authors believe that Ilija loved his neighbors very much, so he created a special planet for them, the Ilijada, where they enjoy a world tailored to their needs.

The Fantastika cycle includes 32 paintings. The motifs in Ilija Bosilj's paintings are not common for a naive painters, but the motifs of the fantastic, that is, the symbolic, are not his "invention", they have existed since the existence of naive art. 

It is not the motives that are fantastic in Ilija's paintings from this cycle, but the unreal (fantastic) relations between the form and the content of the work of art. The themes in the paintings are not only fantastic scenes, but also motifs from Serbian medieval myths and legends, as well as events and personalities related to the Battle of Kosovo.

The fund of the Museum also includes works by other artists. Among them are fourteen works with Old Testament motifs, ie motifs that can be related to the Jewish people. The work Expulsion from Paradise by Matija Skurjeni is motivated by the second and third chapters of Genesis, that is, the moment of the expulsion of Adam and Eve from the Garden of Eden.

The motif of the painting Colon by Salom Safed is related to the moment of the exodus of the Jews from Egypt, which is indicated by the Hebrew text at the bottom of the play taken from the Psalms and Exodus.