Jakob Savinšek

Jakob Savinšek (4 February 1922 – 17 August 1961) was a Slovene sculptor, illustrator and poet.

Savinšek was born in the Upper Carniolan town of Kamnik, then part of the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes (now in Slovenia), where he spent his youth. After finishing secondary school in Ljubljana, he studied medicine at the University of Ljubljana. In the late 1930s and early 1940s, he studied drawing under the tutorship of Rihard Jakopič and sculpture under the supervision of Karla Bulovec Mrak. During World War II and the Italian occupation of Ljubljana he was imprisoned in the Ljubljana Castle for collaborating with the Liberation Front of the Slovenian People. In 1942, he was later sent to the Gonars concentration camp. He was released after the Italian armistice in September 1943. A devout Roman Catholic, he decided to join the Slovenian Home Guard, an Anti-Communist militia collaborating with the Wehrmacht against the partisan resistance. He deserted before the end of the war, thus securing himself an indulgent treatment by the new Titoist regime.