A great man is one who collects knowledge the way a bee collects honey and uses it to help people overcome the difficulties they endure - hunger, ignorance and disease!
- Nikola Tesla

Remember, remember always, that all of us, and you and I especially, are descended from immigrants and revolutionists.
- Franklin Roosevelt

While their territory has been devastated and their homes despoiled, the spirit of the Serbian people has not been broken.
- Woodrow Wilson

Marta Milosevic-Brankovic

Marta Milosevic-Brankovic was born in Belgrade, Serbia. She has captured the attention of audience and critics alike since her concerto debut at Ganz Rudolph Hall in Chicago in 2005 where one of the most famous pianists alive, Abbey Simon (Professor at the Juilliard School) personally attended the concert and highly acclaimed her performance of Bach and Chopin. At the age of six Marta took her first piano lesson and already a year later she played her first public concert. She was 21 when she graduated at the Music Art Academy in Belgrade as the youngest student with the highest GPA in the generation. She received her early musical training in class of Russian Professor Jakuthon Mlhailovich, a graduate from the Moscow Conservatory. At the same time she has also completed Media studies at the University of Art in Belgrade. During her studies, she worked with eminent artists from her country and auended a number of piano master courses of the following Professors: Sijavus Gadzijev (Moscow). Tamara Stefanovic (Koeln). Dr. David Abot (Zurich-New York), Dr. Tatjana Rankovich (New York), Dr. Omitry Rachmanov (Chicago-New York) and many others.

In the summer of 2005 Marta was given scholarship to participate in the famous International Keyboard Institute and Festival (IKIF) in New York where she worked with concert performers such as Jerome Rose, Fabio Bidini, Dr. Dmitry Bashirov, Viktor Rosenbaum, Michael Oelbaum and Irina Morozova and she had couple of highly acclaimed performances.

Marta started her international career in her early twenties. As a solo pianist and chamber musician she received a number of first prizes in her homeland, scholarships and foreign prizes such as: the second prize at the International Competition Nikolai Rubinstein in Paris. the third prize at Carlo Ceki International Competition in Rome.

Recently the Ministry of Culture in Serbia awarded her with special scholarship for gifted young artists who are making successful solo career in the United States.

Marta recorded for radio and television In Belgrade and in Chicago. She also recorded four TV video clips with works of Chopin, Schoenberg, Ligeti and Bartok for national TV programs. They are an interesting mixture of techno sound incorporated in traditional classical piano sound. In 2002, she had a role of pianist performer of Schoenberg works and a role of main protagonist in an experimental movie. The movie was awarded the First prize at the International Festival of Short and Documentary Film in Belgrade. She has also appeared in couple of different movies during the 2005 as a performer and as an actor. Marta spent one year at the Roosevelt University in the special section called Chicago College of Performing Arts where she received a scholarship for starting Master degree in Piano Performance in the studio of well known Russian-Jewish Professor Dmitry Rachmanov: At the same time she has finished Master degree in Belgrade at the University of Art in department sponsored by European Union in the subject about Theory of Performance.

Marta lives in Miami, Florida where she has recently finished Master Program in piano performance at Florida International University in studio of well known concert performer and Professor Kemal Gekic. She received a lull scholarship for her studies. So far Marta has given more than fifty solo concerts in Europe and in her home country. She gave performances In Miami at the Yamaha Piano Music Center in February of 2007 and in the Wertheim Hall at FIU in May.

From January 2006 she played in numerous halls including Carnival Center (New Opera House) where she participated two times in the Subtropics Festival performing Cage music and in Bass Museum. where she performed Cuban and Austrian music.

In November of 2007 she appeared couple of times as a soloist with FlU Wind Ensemble. In March of 2008 Marta had highly acclaimed solo concerts in Porto Vita Villa Grande in Aventura. Steinway Gallery in Coral Gables and In Bass Museum of Art.

During 2009 among numerous recitals in South Florida back by popular demand cycle at the Bass Museum of Art, organized a special recital for Marta for 300 people.

Source: Official Web Site


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Marko V. Jaric

Marko V. Jaric was born on March 17, 1952 in Belgrade. He completed his elementary school education in Belgrade and attended the Air Force Military High School in Mostar where he graduated in 1970 as the best student of his class. Subsequently he enrolled at the Faculty of Natural Sciences and Mathematics where he received a degree in physics in 1974, graduating as the best student of his generation. He received his Ph.D. in 1978 at the City University of New York with professor Joseph Birman, one of the most prominent physicists in solid-state physics, as his thesis advisor.

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Sailors of the Sky

A conversation with Fr. Stamatis Skliris and Fr. Marko Rupnik on contemporary Christian art

In these timely conversations led by Fr. Radovan Bigovic, many issues are introduced that enable the contemporary reader to deepen and expand his or her understanding of the role of art in the life of the Church. Here we find answers to questions on the crisis of contemporary ecclesiastical art in West and East; the impact of Impressionism, Expressionism, Cubism, Surrealism and Abstract painting on contemporary ecclesiastical painting; and a consideration of the main distrinction between iconography and secular painting. The dialogue, while resolving some doubts about the difference between iconography, religious painting, and painting in general, reconciles the requirement to obey inconographic canons with the freedom essential to artistic creativity, demonstrating that obedience to the canons is not a threat to the vitatlity of iconography. Both artists illumine the role of prayer and ascetisicm in the art of iconography. They also mention curcial differences between iconography in the Orthodox Church and in Roman Catholicism. How important thse distinctions are when exploring the relationship between contemporary theology and art! In a time when postmodern "metaphysics' revitalizes every concept, these masters still believe that, to some extent, Post-Modernism adds to the revitatiztion of Christian art, stimulating questions about "artistic inspiration" and the essential asethetic categories of Christian painting. Their exceptionally wide, yet nonetheless deep, expertise assists their not-so-everday connections between theology, ar, and modern issues concerning society: "society" taken in its broader meaning as "civilization." Finally, the entire artistic project of Stamatis and Rupnik has important ecumenical implications that aswer a genuine longing for unity in the Christian word.

The text of this 94-page soft-bound book has been translated from the Serbian by Ivana Jakovljevic, Fr. Gregory Edwards, and Andrijana Krstic. Published by Sebastian Press, Western American Diocese of the Serbian Orthodox Church, Contemporary Christian Thought Series, number 7, First Edition, ISBN: 978-0-9719505-8-0