Ivan Brkljačić (1977, Serbia) holds a BA (2001) and MA (2005) degree in composition from the Faculty of Music in Belgrade, from the classes of Srđan Hofman and Zoran Erić. In 2012, he successfully defended his doctoral artistic project, titled Istar: A Cycle of Nascent Musical Cartoons for Performance in a Theatrical Stage Set, under the supervision of Prof. Srđan Hofman. Pieces by Brkljačić have been performed a number of times in Belgrade and other cities in Serbia. Also, his music has been performed in Belgium, the Netherlands, Canada, Sweden, Brazil, Czech Republic, Italy, Austria, Slovenia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Poland, Germany, Croatia, Macedonia, France, Romania, Hungary, and Australia, where his work Jinx was performed by Modern Music Ensemble at the opening of the 2010 World Music Days in Sydney.

Since 2005, Brkljačić has taught at the Music Theory Department of the Faculty of Music in Belgrade, where he is currently employed as an associate professor and vice-dean for teaching. Between 2007 and 2015, he was the programming selector of the International Composers’ Forum.

Eleganza nuova is one of the characters (a group character comprising at first 12 and then ultimately 13 members) in Brkljačić’s instrumental theatre piece Istar, premièred in 2011. In tonight’s new première, that character continues its life outside instrumental theatre, as a newly formed self-standing composition for chamber string orchestra. Comprising ten scenes with different characters, the piece features a musical tissue that specifically relies on the phenomena of the elegant, exalted, refined, elite, glamorous, unattainable…