IN THE BEGINNING WAS THE KINGDOM: an exhibition marking 1100 years of the Croatian Kingdom

Klovićevi dvori Gallery, October 16, 2025 – March 15, 2026 This year, for the first time since gaining independence and sovereignty, Croatia is celebrating a jubilee year – the 1100th anniversary of the Croatian Kingdom, whose central figure is King Tomislav, the first Croatian king of native origin. Alongside numerous cultural, social, and even political programs inspired by the mythical status that King Tomislav continues to enjoy among the Croatian people even 1,100 years later, there is one crowning event that brings together all the reasons why this jubilee is being celebrated in the first place. This is the exhibition In the Beginning There Was a Kingdom, which opens on October 16 at the Klovićevi dvori Gallery and presents an impressive display divided into several thematic sections: from the dominant historiographical, social, and cultural ones to those focused on heritage. The exhibition explains the phenomenology of what we today call the Croatian state—what we mean when we speak of the idea of Croatian statehood throughout the centuries. At the heart of the exhibition In the Beginning There Was a Kingdom lies precisely the idea of Croatian statehood that existed for centuries within the people themselves, among their literate and educated individuals of the time, within the nobility and the clergy. It is not about deconstructing or reconstructing the mythical status of King Tomislav, but rather about an idea, a desire, a persistent tradition lasting for centuries—the embodiment of the Croatian state—presented through several key categories that are equally and simultaneously represented in the exhibition: the people, language, faith, nation, and tradition.