Slavko Vorkapić

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Slavko Vorkapić (born name Slavoljub Vorkapić) (English Slavko Vorkapich, originally in Serbian Cyrillic Славко Воркапић) (March 17, 1894 – October 20, 1976), was a film director and editor, university professor and painter, Yugoslav (Serbian) emigrant in the United States.

1 Early life
2 Career in the United States
- 2.1 Film work
3 External links

[edit] Early life

Slavko Vorkapić was born on March 17, 1894 in a small village of Dobrinci near Sremska Mitrovica in Syrmia, Vojvodina. (at that time Austro-Hungarian Empire, later Yugoslavia, then Serbia and Montenegro, now Serbia) in town clerk family, where his father Petar insisted that young Slavko should be well-educated family member. After finishing primary education he became student of a well-known regional high-school in nearby town of Sremska Mitrovica, where he made his first steps in art and drawing. (Mileva Marić-Einstein, the first wife and work associate of Albert Einstein went to the same high-school). He continued high-school education in Zemun and later in famous Art School in Belgrade. With scholarship received from Matica srpska, Serbia highest cultural and scientific institution at the time, Vorkapić went to Budapest, Hungary, where he studied art. At the beginning of World War I he immediately returned to his homeland and together with his people, in country invaded from all sides, survived tragic Serbian retreat across Albania in order to reach Allied positions in Greece and Italy. He took ship ride to Italy, from where he reached France. He managed to enter Art Academy in Paris, but soon after, he moved to Montparnasse among other Avant-garde artists. He took part in 1917 and 1919 collective painter exhibits.

[edit] Career in the United States

[edit] Film work

Slavko Vorkapić's dream to go to the United States was fulfilled in 1920. For a short time, he lived in New York City. Then, for almost a year, he roamed the country nearly homeless, until his arrival in Hollywood in July 1921. Although he started his film career as a painter and an actor, he became best-known as a special effects expert, film artist, film teacher, director, editor and became one of the most respected filmmakers in the period between the two World Wars. Vorkapić made a great number of documentaries and experimental films, that served as classical film models for all future filmmakers. He was appointed as a head of the cinema department of the University of Southern California. Vorkapić co-directed the experimental short film The Life and Death of 9413: a Hollywood Extra (1928) with Robert Florey, and Moods of the Sea (1941) with filmmaker John Hoffman (1904-1980).

He is best known for his montage work on classic Hollywood films such as Viva Villa (1934), David Copperfield (1935), San Francisco (1936), The Good Earth (1937), and Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939). In October 2005, the DVD collection Unseen Cinema: Early American Avant Garde Film 1894-1941 included a one-minute montage sequence Vorkapich did for the otherwise lost feature film Manhattan Cocktail (1928), directed by Dorothy Arzner.

An effects technique, the vorkapich, is named after him. His protege, Art Clokey, learned kinescope animation techniques under him and went on to create the Gumby animated series. During 1950s he was in Yugoslavia where he made one of his last full-length movies Hanka.

Slavko Vorkapić died in Spain on the estate of his son on October 20, 1976. Although slightly forgiven in his home region Syrmia, two of his master drawings, his gift during his visit to Yugoslavia , are still jealously kept in the Syrmia Museum in Sremska Mitrovica.

Recent reports said that his descendants are ready to fulfill Vorkapić’s last will and to donate the same museum with all of his remaining art drawings and much of his film material.