Sculptor Svitoslav Peruzzi was one of the founders of the Vesna art club in Vienna. The club was founded in 1903 by Slovenian and Croatian students, including Saša Šantel, Gvidon Birolla, Maksim Gaspari, Svetoslav Peruzzi, Hinko Smrekar, Fran Tratnik, Tomislav Krizman, Ivan Meštrović and Mirko Rački. The members of the club highlighted Slovenian folk art in their works and focused mainly on book illustration, caricature and satire.

Svetoslav Peruzzi’s work was characterised by a calm realist tone with Secession-style poetic elements. In 1904, the sculptor created a realist sculpture of his academy colleague and friend, the painter and illustrator Gvidon Birolla. The bust of the Vesna art club co-founder gives psychological depth to its subject. Despite the realist modelling of the figure’s face and hands with details of pronounced veins, the rough treatment of the suit in this well-rendered portrait reveals a Secession-style approach. Karel Dobida described Birolla’s portrait of as “one of Peruzzi’s finest works and an excellent demonstration of his creativity in the prime of his youth”.