Meet the teachers.
Guided by a personal experience of long term self practice, leading yoga teacher training programs, various yoga retreats and a successful yoga studio, we structured this program for you to reach all the benefits of a meaningful approach to life by integrating the body-mind complex. Creating space for true reflection as well as giving your body and mind extra care and attention is a remedy for every human being to live an integrated and harmonious life.
Our approach is a combination of doing and not doing; activity and inactivity; stimulation and relaxation; beauty and discipline; West and East. Take your personal development to a higher level made for self discovery and let your senses enjoy the beauty of a beautiful environment in which the magic of life so easily happens.
MARCO BIANCO
Born and raised in Italy, Marco dedicated his life to the wisdom of yoga by spreading it to people worldwide. Today he lives in Zagreb with his wife, Petra, taking care of different schools and programs dedicated to yogic education. He is the advisor for Croatia at the European Yoga Council, delegate of the European Yoga Federation, and international advisor of the World Yoga Council.
He met eastern philosophies very young in the late 80s and, since then, in his rich life experience, he had the opportunity to meet and work with many great teachers of many different traditions such as Iyengar Yoga, Shivananda Yoga, and Ashtanga Yoga. Besides his excellent knowledge of the asana practice and anatomy of the human body, he is a passionate meditator, meditation teacher, and philosophy scholar in the field of Patanjali Yoga Sutras. In the nineties, he received his education in yoga from Carlo Patrian, the teacher who, after spending many years in India in contact with the most renowned yoga teachers of the 19th and 20th centuries, was the first to bring yoga to Italy in the 60s. After several years of study in direct contact with his teacher and mentor Carlo, Marco received the diploma of Yoga Teacher in Milan at Carlo’s “Istituto Yoga.”
In 2005 he moved to Croatia, where he was invited to teach, and soon after, he developed the first Croatian training program for yoga teachers according to the high international standards of the European Yoga Federation, Yoga Alliance, and International Yoga Federation.
In early 2012, he opened the Pink Elephant Yoga House with his wife Petra, and together, they created a new program for yoga teachers called Pink Elephant Yoga Institute and a three-year program called School of Consciousness dedicated to the practice of yogic philosophy. The Institute is registered by the European Yoga Federation and recognized by the “World Movement for Yoga and Ayurveda” and “World Yoga and Ayurveda Community”.
Marco is often invited to teach as a guest teacher in many different countries. He constantly collaborates with many teachers, particularly with Ayurveda and Yoga master Swami Suryananda (Amadio Bianchi), with whom he is bound by profound respect and a long-term friendship. He teaches Hatha, Ashtanga, Vinyasa, meditation, and philosophy classes. Marco’s classes contain a great sense of precision, alignment, fluidity, strength, philosophical wisdom, and a touch of fun!
PETRA BIANCO
Petra grew up in a yogic environment in Zagreb, as her parents practiced and taught yoga in the eighties. In 2001, when she was working worldwide as a successful professional model, yoga became her daily practice, helping her to balance worldly life under the fashion industry's reflectors and her intimate nature of yearning for connection from within. Very soon, she realized the yogic path was her life calling. After finishing her career in 2010, she enrolled in a teacher training program in Rishikesh with Kamal Singh and Sunil Sharma and started teaching the Ashtanga method daily. Today she is studying the Ashtanga system with Eddie Stern, who also introduced her to the power of mantra chanting and puja setups.
In 2012 her intense passion for breath work brought her to study under the guidance and tradition of O.P. Tiwari, one of the few living masters in India teaching pranayama practice in a traditional way. With his blessing, guidance, and extensive yearly education in the pranayama teacher training program at Kaivalydhama Yoga Institute of India in 2015, she became the first registered pranayama teacher of this tradition in Croatia. A few times each year, she returns to Kaivalydhama to continue her pranayama studies with Tiwariji and his son Sudhir Tiwari.
In 2012, with her husband Marco, she opened the Pink Elephant Yoga House, a well-known house for Yoga in Croatia, and since then developed 300 hours and 600 hours teacher training program taught in Zagreb, Rijeka, and worldwide called Pink Elephant Yoga Institute.
Petra is a passionate meditator and certified Shakti meditation teacher very grateful to her guide Ananda Vdovic, a well-known meditation teacher, painter, and musician, for guiding her on the path of self-discovery since she was a teenager. Her interest in yogic philosophy brought her to study with Dr.Rajani Pradhan, with whom she is studying Sanskrit, particularly the chanting of Patanjali Yoga Sutras. She is currently dedicated to a Wellness Coaching Program specializing in feminine form healing arts, particularly Ayurveda and Tantra, folk herbology, contemporary neuroscience, somatic psychology, and functional medicine.
Besides teaching, she is a passionate traveler and sociologist by profession who loves to share her energy with people around the globe. Petra's teachings are based on a deep understanding of all aspects of yoga: anatomical, philosophical, and experiential. Today her way of teaching is mainly oriented toward classical pranayama and different aspect of working with Prana Shakti. In teaching Ashtanga and Hatha yoga, she works a lot with mindful hands-on adjustments and energy transfer, breath, and bandha work by focusing the attention of students on their personal experiences and discoveries.
Meet our collaborators.
ASHTANGA YOGA MAMA
IRENA BARTOLEC
Irena Bartolec is an authorized KPJAYI Yoga Teacher, currently living in Costa Rica. She holds and organizes annual Retreats, Workshops, and Teacher Trainings internationally in Bali, Europe,Costa Rica and beyond. Irena has 20 years of extensive Teaching and Management experience in the fields of Yoga, Health, Wellness and Mindfulness. She is the Creator and Director at Ashtanga Yoga Mama, established in 2014.
Irena has studied Yoga and Meditation extensively with Sri. K. Patthabi Jois, Sharat R. Jois, Rolf Naujokat, Richard Freeman, Lino Miele, Nancy Gilgoff, Eddie Stern, Dr. Jayashree and Prof. Narasimhan, Sharon Salzberg, Bodhi College. Their great wealth of knowledge, generosity, and tutelage have formed the pillars for Irena’s own yogic teaching style, and accompanying philosophies.
In 2014 Irena received her Authorisation to teach Ashtanga Yoga from The KPJAYI Institute in Mysore, India. She spent many years in Mysore, returning annually, establishing a deep relationship to the Ashtanga practice and the traditional lineage, at the time. She had the rare opportunity to study Yoga and Mindfulness beside a carefully curated group of noted and revered spiritual Teachers and Masters. Her search for knowledge has taken her all over the world, from India to the USA, Europe to Asia, Central America to Hawaii. She remains committed to spending time with teachers whom she admires, and they dutifully inspire her teaching path.
Irena Bartolec received her Master of Science in Kinesiology Degree from the University of Zagreb, Croatia in 2004 where she graduated with a Master’s Degree in Physiology. Her final thesis was titled “ The Influence of Yoga on the Cardiovascular and Respiratory System.”
Irena continued her education in various Yoga schools such as The Yoga Workshop in Colorado, Samahita in Thailand, and The Birthright School in the U.K.
This extensive education gives Irena a strong platform to teach different levels of classes and meet her student’s individual needs. She is fully versed in anatomical studies, various physical therapy programs, and has worked extensively with clients who suffer from various physical and mental dis-eases. Irena’s refined teaching philosophy balances well honed strength with proper alignment, ensuring that students develop an extensive yet firm Yoga practice, equally pledging importance on Creativity, Individuality, Discipline and Tradition.
In 2004 Irena opened The Body Element Studio in her hometown of Zagreb, Croatia. She designed, conceptualised, created, managed, owned and taught at Body Element for 10 years. Her passion for Yoga and Wellness supplied Irena with the vision and fortitude to establish the first traditional Ashtanga Vinyasa program in Croatia. Her early teaching choices and business inceptions laid the foundation for a rapidly growing and currently successful Yoga community in Croatia.
In 2014 Irena Bartolec moved to Bali where she taught at Seminyak Yoga Shala until May 2019. She developed and lead their Ashtanga Yoga program, overseeing and teaching a very successful and influential Mysore program that drew students from all over the world.
She is a creator and lead teacher for Cosmos Yoga Academy Teacher training program.
In 2020. due to unpredictable global events, she ended up in Costa Rica where she is currently living and hosting private tailored retreats on a Pacific Coast of Guanacaste.
She is Forever grateful to this beautiful country and opportunity to create and share this peaceful oasis with the community.
Irena is a published writer on The Medium, contributor at Sensa lifestyle Magazine since 2008 and meditation teacher at InsightTimer.