Goranka Vrus-Murtić passed away in Zagreb on 1 February 2026. She was born in Velika Gorica on 22 February 1937. She began her artistic education at the Academy of Fine Arts in Zagreb, graduating in 1960. She studied in the class of Oton Postružnik and continued her postgraduate training in the master workshop of Krsto Hegedušić until 1962.
Her work was grounded in expressive abstraction, later incorporating elements of landscape. The defining qualities of her painting can be described as a lyrical colorism of remarkable energy, evident in both her palette and brushwork. Alongside painting, she also worked successfully in enamel, tapestry, theatre costume design, and set design, notably collaborating with director Vlado Habunek.
She was the wife of the renowned painter Edo Murtić, and following his death in 2005, she led his foundation and advocated for the establishment of a museum dedicated to his oeuvre, to which she donated works from her own collection. From 1972 onwards, she was also a member of KIC’s Forum Gallery, actively participating in shaping its programme and institutional direction.
She exhibited at The Forum Gallery on several occasions in group exhibitions, as well as in two solo exhibitions: in November 1984, with a foreword by Petar Selem, and in May 1995, with a foreword by Zvonko Maković. She will be remembered in Croatian painting for what Maković described on the occasion of the 1995 exhibition as “the exuberant vitality of her handwriting” and “a profound sense of freedom.”