Nikola Graovac was born in Lika, in the village of Vrebac, in 1907. At the age of 15, he came to Belgrade and did various jobs, in order to send part of his income to his family in Lika. He worked hard and saved to earn enough to go to painting school, to become what he really wanted to be – a painter. At that time, the most famous school of painting was in the studio of Jovan Bijelić. Young Graovac successfully enrolled in this school. He exhibited for the first time in 1933 and had his first solo exhibition in 1935 in the Art Pavilion “Cvijeta Zuzorić”. He is one of our most important representatives of coloristic expressionism. He was an extremely prolific painter, whose oeuvre includes about 10,000 paintings that are in official institutions, many institutions, companies and private collections. He died in his house in Oplenac, on January 16, 2000.