Dubravka Preradović, Research Associate at the Institute for Balkan Studies SASA is a co-author of the monograph Documents for the Study of the Church of the Mother of God at the Gradac Monastery

Dubravka Preradović, Research Associate at the Institute for Balkan Studies of the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts (SASA), is a co-author of the monograph Documents for the Study of the Church of the Mother of God at the Gradac Monastery, published by the Republic Institute for the Protection of Monuments of Cultural Heritage, Belgrade. This book is the first volume in the newly established “Documents” series. In addition to Dr Preradović, the authors of the monograph are Dr Vladimir Božinović and Dr Dragana Pavlović. The monograph presents, for the first time, a rich body of archival and documentary material on the Church of the Mother of God, which has until now largely remained unpublished and unexamined.

Dr Preradović’s chapter is entitled “Research, Documentation, and Protection of the Architecture and Wall Paintings of Gradac until 1951: the Context and the Results”. It traces the process by which Queen Helen’s endowment entered the focus of Serbian and international scholars, from the first drawings by Mihailo Valtrović and Dragutin Milutinović (1875) to pioneering conservation efforts in the twentieth century and the publication of the first scholarly monograph on Gradac in 1951. Through a careful analysis of diverse sources – archival documents, old photographs, drawings, field notes and reports gathered during years of research in Belgrade and Parisian archives – a unique dossier has been compiled, documenting the condition of the Gradac church prior to its reconstruction and providing a key to understanding lost details.