Branka (or Ančica, or Ivana, or Jelena) Balen was born in Osijek in 1941. She graduated in art history and English at the Faculty of Philosophy in Zagreb University, and has spent her whole working life in the Gallery of Fine Arts in Osijek, as manager of the 18th and 19th century Painters Collection. From 1870 to 1999 she organised a great many exhibitions of her own devising, the most prestigious of which were Miroslav Kraljevic, Fine Artists of Slavonia, Johann Friedrich Overbeck, Rudolf Valić, Jovan Gojkovic, Franjo Pflaz and Josip Franjo Mücke, as well as Contemporary Artists of Slavonia and Views of Slavonia in the 19th century, Three Centuries of the Gallery of Fine Arts - a guide to the new permanent display. All the exhibitions were accompanied by catalogues. A monograph on Mücke was published by the Croatian Academy in 2000, with reviews by the painter Josip Vaništa and Dr Andre Mohorovičić.
She has written 12 scholarly articles, taken part in 22 conferences and congresses with addresses. She has written nine books and monographs published by the Gallery of Fine Arts in Osijek, and numerous catalogues. She has taken part in many conferences, is a member of numerous associations and working groups: the Publication Committee of the Paper of Slavonian Museums; the Croatian Academy Art Section; the Osijek Institute for Scientific and Artistic Work; the Executive Committee of the Croatian Museums Association, Zagreb; and president of the Croatian-Austrian Association of Osijek. For her dedicated work she was awarded the Croatian Museums Association "Pavao Ritter Vitezović" Prize for lifetime achievement in 2007.

NB. Data taken from the questionnaire, material taken from the Personnel Archives of the MDC, and from an interview recorded on October 20, 2004.