MAXO (Maximilian) VANKAwas born in 1889 in Croatia, the illegitimate son of Austrian nobility. He spent his first eight years working as part of a peasant family. When his maternal grandmother discovered his existence, she gave him an aristocratic life living in a castle and his education included art.
He studied at the art academy in Zagreb and then the Academie Royale des Beaux Arts in Brussels. As a 25-year-old student, he won the gold medal of King Albert. He continued to exhibit throughout Europe, winning many honors. He taught art in Zagreb.
He served with the Belgian Red Cross, because he was a pacifist and would not serve in the regular army.
Though he found success in Croatia, the growing threat to his Jewish family fueled his immigration to America in 1934. He won the heart of the daughter of an American doctor, Margaret Stetten. Thanks to a Father Zagar, he arrived in Millvale PA in 1937
He is known for the Vanka Murals at St. Nicholas Church, a small Croatian Catholic Church in Millvale, set atop the hillside across the Allegheny River from the bustling city of Pittsburgh. This was the first Croatian Catholic parish in the United States. (Our area has many Croatian families and we are close to several Croatian priests).
Father Albert Zagar, the parish priest, longed for color on his church’s plain walls and specifically “not average Church murals”– so, he invited Maxo Vanka to come and paint inside the small Romanesque church, which had recently been rebuilt after a destructive fire.
Maxo accepted and came to Millvale, collaborating with the priest to create one of the most spectacular collections of murals in the world. The artist painted a portion of the murals in 1937 and, in 1941, returned to the church to paint the remainder of the scenes. The murals depict Christ and Mary in images of war and offer social commentary on world events like fascism, war and poverty. They depict Croatian immigrants coming to Americato seek a better life, grateful to have escaped the slaughter taking place in their homeland.
This was Maxo’s "Mothers offer up their sons for labor" theme, a tribute to all those who worked diligently in the mills and mines in and around Pittsburgh. One mural depicts the fire and collapse of one of the coal burning mills and as a Croatian mother cradles her dead son, her other three sons rush into the mill to save their fellow workers and are killed.
A committed pacifist, the intensity of Vanka's beliefs are depicted clearly in post-war murals. One is of the Virgin Mary coming between two warring soldiers. Another depicts two soldiers battling each other, yet this time it is Jesus who attempts to intercede and one of the soldiers accidentally thrusts his bayonet into Jesus' heart.
His Millvale murals fueled Vanka to continue his work shining a light on the story of immigrants in America, social justice, and the quietude of rural life. Now living in Eastern Pennsylvania, he founded the art department at Delaware Valley College of Science and Agriculture in New Britainand continued to create art.
His themes of social justice are just as relevant today as they were sixty years ago. Immigrants to Americasee that Maxo’s story is that of all of us, what it’s like to create a new life in a new land.
On his philosophy of painting, he declared:“I painted so that Divinity in becoming human, would make humanity divine.”
Images:~ Immigrant Mother Gives Her Sons for American Industry
~ Croatian Mother Raises Her Son for War
~Mary on the Battlefield
