Ana Šverko, PhD, M. Arch.
Senior Research Associate, Senior Research Adviser in Title
T. +385 21 345 036
E. asverko / ipu.hr
Ana Šverko is an architect and architecture historian, a Senior Research Associate at the Institute of Art History – Cvito Fisković Center in Split. Her research focuses on the architectural history of the Eastern Adriatic coast in a cross-cultural context.
In 1998 she completed a degree in Architecture at the University of Zagreb. She completed her Master of Urban Design in 2002 at the University of California Berkeley (USA). In 2011 she completed her PhD in the History of Architecture at the University of Zagreb.
She worked on conservation practices at the Conservation Department of the Ministry of Culture in Split from 1998 until 2011, and from 2009 onwards she was a senior advisor – conservator for immovable cultural heritage. Since 2012, she has been working at the Institute of Art History – Cvito Fisković Center in Split.
From 2013 to 2014 she participated in the Pontes Adriatici: The Network of Cultural Exchange on the Adriatic project led by Prof. Igor Fisković (University of Zagreb, Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences). From 2014 to 2015 she participated in Harvard University’s research seminar From Riverbed to Seashore. Art on the Move in Eastern Europe and the Mediterranean in the Early Modern Period supported by a Connecting Art Histories grant from the Getty Foundation; the project was conceived and led by Prof. Alina Payne. In 2016 she was a participant in The International Training Programme at the British Museum in the Department of Greece and Rome. She received a Research Support Grant from The Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art in 2020-21.
From 2014 to 2017 she led the interdisciplinary project Dalmatia – A Destination of the European Grand Tour in the 18th and 19th Century (Grand Tour Dalmatia) funded by the Croatian Science Foundation. This project was dedicated to collecting and analysing texts and images focused on Dalmatia from the perspective of travel writers. The Grand Tour Dalmatia project gave rise to a series of international conferences which have taken place every year from 2014 to the present. These conferences are dedicated to those cross-cultural and historical aspects of the Croatian coast which were gradually uncovered, particularly in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, when numerous travel writers and artists undertook the Grand Tour. She has edited two essay collections featuring works presented at the conferences: Robert Adam and Diocletian’s Palace in Split, Zagreb 2017 (with Joško Belamarić), and Discovering Dalmatia. Dalmatia in travelogues, images and photographs, Zagreb, 2019 (with Katrina O'Loughlin and Elke Katharina Wittich).
As part of the Grand Tour Dalmatia project, she contributed to the creation of an online chrono-geographical database that comprises books, images, photographs, essays and letters created as a result of the direct experience of Dalmatian heritage from the perspectives of authors-travellers. Its conceptual framework development is an ongoing project. She continued her work in the field of the digital humanities at a workshop supported by the Getty Foundation entitled Advanced Topics in Digital Art History (2018-2019) as part of its Digital Art History initiative.
Since 2018 she has led the Glossary of Classical Architecture in Croatian project funded by the Croatian Science Foundation as part of the Development of Croatian Special Field Terminology project. The Institute of Art History would be through this project the first contributor from Croatia to the Getty Research Institute’s multilingual Art & Architecture Thesaurus.
Since 2019 she has been a team member on the project Exposition. Themes and Aspects of Croatian Photography from the 19th Century until Today, which is funded by the Croatian Science Foundation, and led by Sandra Križić Roban. Her focus is on photography within the study of the memory of place.
Since 2012 she has been teaching at the University of Split, Faculty of Civil Engineering, Architecture and Geodesy, where she runs the course Urban Planning Research. She has co-supervised over 20 theses. She was guest lecturer at the University of Zagreb, University of Ljubljana (Slovenia) and Cornel University (USA).
She has published in notable Croatian and international scholarly and professional journals and books. She participated in both Croatian and international conferences and professional and student workshops as a participant, and often as a co-organiser. Since 2012, she has been leading a series of public lectures alongside Joško Belamarić, at the Institute of Art History – Cvito Fisković Center in Split.
Awards and honors
2020-2021 The Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art, Research Support Grant: to support a research trip for the project Thomas Graham Jackson and the Eastern Coast of the Adriatic
2020 The Croatian National Science Annual Award for Popularization and Promotion of Science in 2019
2018-2019 Croatian Science Foundation Grant: Glossary of Classical Architecture in Croatian – research project
2018-2019 Getty Foundation Grant (Digital Art History): Advanced Topics in Digital Art History: 3D (Geo)Spatial Networks – workshop participant
2017 Croatian Architects’ Association Award: “Neven Šegvić” award for the best non-fictional, critical, scientific and theoretical work on architecture for the book: A City in (not) a house. A dialogue between the new and the old Split: urban design prelude, Zagreb, 2016.
2014-2017 Croatian Science Foundation Grant: Dalmatia – A Destination of the European Grand Tour in the 18th and 19th Century (Grand Tour Dalmatia) – research project
2016 The British Museum London Scholarship: International Training Programme
2014-2015 Getty Foundation Grant (Connecting Art Histories): From Riverbed to Seashore. Art on the Move in Eastern Europe and the Mediterranean in the Early Modern Period – postdoctoral researcher
2014 Monument Trust Scolarship: The Attingham Study Programme in Belgium – The Attingham Study Programme
2014 Charter of Croatian Society of Art Historians for outstanding contribution to Croatian art history for the book: Designs of the Venetian Neoclassical Architect Giannantonio Selva in Dalmatia, Zagreb 2013.
2010 Monument Trust Scholarship and Hazel Wood Scholarship: The Dutch Historic House – The Attingham Study Programme
2006 Association for Cultural Exchange Scholarship: The Attingham Summer School
2003 Getty Foundation Grant (Conference Travel Grant): 10th International Conference of National Trusts, Edinburgh, Scotland, UK
2002 Eva Li Fund, UC Berkeley (Conference Travel Grant): The Physical Fitness of Cities Symposium: Vision and Ethic in City Building, Salt Lake City, Utah, USA
2002 Gadsby Trugett Travel Grant, UC Berkeley: Study Trip to Edinburgh, Scotland, UK
2001-2002 International House Fellowship, UC Berkeley: Master of Urban Design, College of Environmental Design, UC Berkeley
2001-2002 Francis Violich Dalmatian Fellowship, UC Berkeley: Master of Urban Design, College of Environmental Design, UC Berkeley
2001 University Scolarship UC Berkeley: Master of Urban Design, College of Environmental Design, UC Berkeley