Ratko Lalić was born on February 6, 1944, in Dolipolje, near Visoko. He enrolled in the School of Applied Arts in Sarajevo in 1959. He graduated from the Academy of Fine Arts and completed postgraduate studies in the class of Professor Stojan Ćelić in 1975 in Belgrade. He is a recipient of the Grand Prize of the Rista and Beta Vukanović Fund from the Faculty of Fine Arts, the October Award of the City of Belgrade, and the April 6th Award of Sarajevo. He also won the Painting Award at the October Salon in Belgrade in 1975, the Purchase Award of the Sarajevo City Museum at the Collegium Artisticum exhibition in 1981, the Painting Award in Skopje at the 8th SULUJ Exhibition, and the Purchase Award of the Art Gallery in Banja Luka. In 1989, he received the Purchase Award for Drawing at the Yugoslav Drawing Exhibition in Zagreb. The University of Arts in Belgrade awarded him the Grand Plaque and Charter of the University of Arts in recognition of his exceptional contributions to the development of the Faculty of Applied Arts and the University of Arts. He served as a professor of drawing and painting at the Academy in Sarajevo and later as a professor at the Academy of Fine Arts in Cetinje in 1992. From 1994, he worked at the Faculty of Applied Arts and Design in Belgrade and co-founded the department at the Faculty of Fine Arts in Banja Luka alongside other colleagues. He has participated in numerous group and solo exhibitions in cities across the former Yugoslavia (Belgrade, Ljubljana, Skopje, Sarajevo, Nikšić, Sombor, Zagreb, Mostar, Zrenjanin, Dubrovnik, Budva, Banja Luka, Novi Sad, Niš) and internationally (Poland, Australia, New Zealand, the Philippines, Italy, Sweden, France, Egypt, India, Romania, Bulgaria, Germany).
