4. 10. – 25. 11. 2007




1960s Prints from the Collections of Czech Galleries Association Members

Organiser: The Czech Galleries Association and the Regional Gallery in Liberec, allowance organisation

Venue: The Regional Gallery in Liberec, allowance organisation

Co-organiser: The Vysočina Regional Gallery in Jihlava, allowance organisation (second showing of the exhibition)

Exhibition concept: Richard Drury MA (Czech Museum of Fine Arts, Prague),

Curating team: Mgr. Jitka Hlaváčková (City Gallery Prague), Mgr. Markéta Kroupová (Regional Gallery, Liberec), Mgr. Božena Vachudová (Gallery of Art, Karlovy Vary)

Exhibition curator: Mgr. Markéta Kroupová

Accompanying events programme organiser: MgA. Petra Křečková (Regional Gallery, Liberec)

Accompanying events and guided tours arranged at the Regional Gallery, Liberec


The Czech Galleries Association was set up on the 2nd January 1992 and it now brings together 28 collection-owning galleries and museums including the Prague National Gallery and the Moravian Gallery in Brno. In the time it has existed, it has organised many meetings, lectures and seminars as well as several joint exhibitions at which it presented its member institutions’ collections of art. Now, in the fifteenth year of the CGA’s existence, a curatorial team has prepared the exhibition ‘Focused View’ with the aim of presenting the range and significance of its members’ print collections.

During the 1960s the spectrum of traditional printmaking techniques broadened in an unprecedented way, absorbing new techniques and materials that even now continue to be relevant. Printmaking experienced a period of flourishing development thanks above all to a number of strong artistic personalities who became classics in their field, most notably Jiří John and Ladislav Čepelák, though also artists from the circle of the UB 12 group (such as Alena Kučerová, Adriena Šimotová, Oldřich Smutný), the Trasa group (Jitka and Květa Válová), the Confrontation exhibitions (Jan Koblasa, Aleš Veselý, Čestmír Janošek and Pavel Nešleha), New Sensitivity (Zdeněk Sýkora, Karel Malich), though also the later Concretists’ Club as well as lone figures such as Vladimír Boudník, Jiří Anderle, Bohuslav Reynek and many others.

This exhibition highlights developments that went on in the artistic centre of Prague with its various emerging trends, from Art Informel and New Figuration to geometric abstraction. However it also focuses on the vital contribution made by artists in other towns and regions, such as Vladislav Mirvald in Louny and Bohuslav Reynek in Petrkov, the Ostrava experimenter Eduard Ovčáček and Jánuš Kubíček from Brno. Within the context of the coexistence of Bohemia and Slovakia in a single state, the acquisition programme of several galleries also included the work of Slovak printmakers, which is why the prints of artists such as Vincent Hložník and Albín Brunovský have been included in the exhibition.

In exceptional cases, Czech galleries also purchased works of international graphic art; at this exhibition the Benedikt Rejt Gallery, Louny, the Museum of Art, Olomouc, and the Gallery of Fine Art, Ostrava, are presenting some of their finest acquisitions from other countries.

Although each member gallery is represented at the exhibition by at least one work, the decisive factor was the quality of the prints themselves and the contribution individual artists made to printmaking. ‘Focused View’ brings together prints by almost one hundred artists.

The exhibition is held under the patronage of Ing. Antonín Schäfer, Deputy Governor of the Liberec Region.

The exhibition is accompanied by a Czech-English catalogue with colour reproductions.

______________________________
The Regional Art Gallery in Liberec
U Tiskárny 1
460 01 Liberec 5
Czech Republic
TEL : 485 106 325
oblgal@ogl.cz
www.ogl.cz