JAN SVOBODA
JASANSKÝ – POLÁK
MICHAL KALHOUS
ALENA KOTZMANNOVÁ
MARIE KRATOCHVÍLOVÁ
MARKÉTA OTHOVÁ
& JIŘÍ KOVANDA

THE OTHER SIDE OF A PHOTOGRAPH

 
As Seen In Their Natural Environment

Jaromír
Novotný

 
A Spectre in the House

Tomáš Bárta

 
Gerbera won't break

Anna Ročňová

 
Interweaving

Michal Škoda

 
the little infinity

Marian Palla

 
Matter in Eternity

Habima Fuchs

 
ANONYMOUS FORM OF SQUARE

JIŘÍ HILMAR

 
LOVE LIFE

JIŘÍ THÝN

 
THE SKY SERENE AS A VAST AQUARIUM

NÉPHÉLI BARBAS

 
unconductive trash

Largely Observed

 
Tomáš Hlavina

TLNVXYK Puzzle

 
Filip Dvořák

The Ravine – The Room

 
Jiří Staněk

Brightness

 
Petr Nikl

Wild Flowerbeds

 
Lukáš Jasanský - Martin Polák

Sir's Hunting Ground

 
Lenka Vítková

First book of emblems

 
Inge Kosková

Flow

 
David Možný

Blink of an Eye

 
Kristián Németh

Warm Greetings

 
Jiří Kovanda

Ten Minutes Earlier

 
Karel Adamus

Minimal Metaphors

 
Tomáš Absolon

RAFA MATA

 
František Skála

TWO YEARS' VACATION

 
Olga Karlíková

At Dawn

 
Pavla Sceranková & Dušan Zahoranský

Work on the Future

 
Selection from the Fait Gallery Collection

ECHO

 
Vladimír Kokolia

The Essential Kokolia

 
Alena Kotzmannová & Q:

The Last Footprint / Seconds Before…

 
Nika Kupyrova

No More Mr Nice Guy

 
Markéta Othová

1990–2018

 
Valentýna Janů

Salty Mascara

 
Jan Merta

Return

 
Radek Brousil & Peter Puklus

Stupid

 
Milan Grygar

LIGHT, SOUND, MOTION

 
Svätopluk Mikyta

Ornamentiana

 
Denisa Lehocká

Luno 550

 
Eva Rybářová

KURT HERMES

 
Christian Weidner a Lukas Kaufmann

ERASE/REWIND

 
Markéta Magidová

TERTIUM NON DATUR

 
Tomáš Bárta

EXTERNAL SETUP

 
Václav Stratil

LANDSCAPES

 
Ondřej Kotrč

TOO LATE FOR DARKNESS

 
Kateřina Vincourová

"WHENEVER YOU SAY."

 
Jiří Franta & David Böhm

BLIND MAN’S DREAM

 
Ewa & Jacek Doroszenko

EXERCISES OF LISTENING

 
Jan Poupě

SET OF VIEWS

 
Peter Demek

STATUS

 
Josef Achrer

BACKSTORIES

 
Radek Brousil

HANDS CLASPED

 
Katarína Hládeková and Jiří Kovanda

SIAMESE UNCLE & MONTAGE

 
Jiří Valoch

WORDS

 
František Skála

TRIBAL

 
Jiří Franta and Ondřej Homola

A BLIND MASTER AND A LIMPING MONK

 
Alžběta Bačíková and Martina Smutná

CARPE DIEM

 
THE SELECTION FROM THE FAIT GALLERY COLLECTION

THE FRAGMENTS OF SETS / THE SELECTION FROM THE FAIT GALLERY COLLECTION

 
Tomáš Absolon

MONET ON MY MIND

 
Kamila Zemková

THE DEAD SPOTS

 
Johana Pošová

WET WET

 
Ivan Pinkava

[ANTROPOLOGY]

 
SELECTION FROM THE FAIT GALLERY COLLECTION

READY OR NOT, HERE I COME

 
Veronika Vlková & Jan Šrámek

THE SOURCE

 
Jan Brož

SSSSSS

 
ONE MOMENT / PART ONE: PRIVATE COLLECTION FROM BRNO

COLLECTOR'S CYCLE OF IMPORTANT PRIVATE COLLECTIONS

 
Alice Nikitinová

IT WOULDN'T BE POINTLESS TO

 
Ondřej Basjuk

THE CULT EXHIBITION

 
Tomáš Bárta

THINGS YOU CAN´T DELETE

 
HE SELECTION FROM THE FAIT GALLERY COLLECTION

FOR MANY DIFFERENT EARS

 
Katarína Hládeková

TO START THE FIRE

 
Marek Meduna

AMONG THE DOG THIEFS

 
THE SELECTION FROM THE FAIT GALLERY COLLECTION

WORDS AMONG SHAPES / SHAPES AMONG NAMES

 
Lukas Thaler

THE PROPELLER

 
Krištof Kintera

Hollywoodoo!

 
Ondřej Homola

ARANGE

 
THE SELECTION FROM THE FAIT GALLERY COLLECTION FOCUSED ON THE YOUNGEST GENERATION

TETRADEKAGON

 
Tomáš Bárta

SOFTCORE

 
Richard Stipl

SENSE OF AN END

 
Lubomír Typlt

THEY WON'T ESCAPE FAR

 
Kateřina Vincourová

THE PRESENCE AS
A TRILL

 
SELECTION FROM THE FAIT GALLERY COLLECTION

OPEN

 
Christian Weidner
/ Vincent Bauer
/ Cornelia Lein

HERE AND
SOMEWHERE
ELSE

 
The selection from the FAIT GALLERY collection

THE SELECTION
FROM THE
COLLECTION

 
Alena Kotzmannová
/ Jan Šerých

A CHI-
LIAGON



THE OTHER SIDE OF A PHOTOGRAPH

23.10.2024 - 20.12.2024

Fait Gallery, Ve Vaňkovce 2, Brno

Curator: Denisa Kujelová

Opening: 23rd October, 7 pm

 

The artists of the collective exhibition The Other Side of a Photograph share unusual visuality, the consistency of light and the concept of individual photographs that challenge conventions. Selected works by the tandem of Lukáš Jasanský and Martin Polák, Michal Kalhous, Alena Kotzmannová, Marie Kratochvílová and Markéta Othová, in dialogue with Jan Svoboda's personal approach to photography and Jiří Kovanda's subtle interventions, allow us to glimpse, through their shared sensitivity, the hidden reality of the world in unexpected detail.

 

The selection of analogue, mostly black-and-white photographs seemingly captures what almost all of us see. In many cases, banal and sometimes even unphotogenic situations, often emphasised in a deliberately unprofessional manner to the point of amateur photography, are sometimes embarrassing. However, the mundane in them opens up wide boundaries of beauty that we probably would not have thought of without their help. Susan Sontag descrines it in the chapter The Heroism of Vision: “No one has ever found ugliness through photography. But many have discovered beauty in this way. Except when the camera is used for documentation or as part of a social ritual, what makes people take photographs is a desire to find something beautiful..."[1]

All of the artists, like Jan Svoboda (1934-1990) from the late 1960s, have in various ways transcended the established principles and canons of photography and in their distinctive approach deliberately questioned its supposed message and formal perfection, expanding it with new possibilities of treatment and perception. "The things I do show no artistry. And I want them not to. I want them not to be pretty, to be as ordinary as possible, not to dazzle, not to shock, not to surprise...[2] Just like Svoboda's work, the works of the mentioned artists have never aspired to conform to standard photographic practices, and like him, some of them have also expressed their opposition to the very term photographer. The theorists Pavel Vančát and Jan Freiberg introduced for their broader thinking and grasp of the medium the fitting tem of "nonphotography"[3] referencing the term anti- or non-photography coined by Nancy Foote in 1976 in relation to postmodern photography.[4]

What makes their photographs so similar is their sophisticated work with technical imperfection, the peculiar tonality of the narrow grey scale and often the use of large formats in sharp contrast to the intimacy and apparent banality of the chosen subjects. Like Svoboda, they focus on their immediate surroundings such as the environment of their homes and the ordinary objects with which we share our private space. In a photograph constructed as an autonomous surface, the role of light in its reflection and absorption is essential, and so is the relationship between objects and their background, with its demarcation often so subtle that the two planes almost merge. This is of course enhanced by the narrow tonality of grey in the choice of black-and-white photography: "Since black-and-white configurations are theoretical, they cannot really exist in the world. But black-and-white photographs do exist. They are in fact the images of the conceptions of the theory of optics, which means that they arose from this theory. [...] Therein lies their strange beauty, identical to the beauty of the conceptual universe. This is why many photographers prefer black-and-white photographs as they reveal more clearly the true meaning of photography, i.e. the world of conceptios."[5]

In regard to the legacy of Jan Svoboda and his exceptional sensitivity, the exhibition shows selected photographs from the broader oeuvres of the individual artists in which forms and procedures more or less referring to Svoboda's work can be recognized. Due to the very narrow theme scope of the exhibition concept, images from various cycles and in some cases diptychs have been selected in collaboration with the artists, and it should be noted that their meaning, which was established in the original context through the composition of their units, has been altered for this specific event.



[1] SONTAG, Susan. O fotografii. Brno, Praha a Litomyšl: Barrister & Principal a Paseka, p. 80.

[2] OTHOVÁ, Markéta; CÍSAŘ, Karel; JANÍČKOVÁ, Adéla, a NOVOTNÝ, Michal. Markéta Othová: již brzy. V Praze: Národní galerie, 2022, p. 7.

[3] VANČÁT, Pavel, a FREIBERG, Jan (eds.). Fotografie?? / Photography?? (exh. cat.). Klatovy: Galerie Klatovy / Klenová, 2004.

[4] FOOTE, Nancy. The Anti-Photographers. Artforum, September 1976, year 15, no. 1., pp. 46–54. Also here:

Douglas FOGLE (ed.). The Last Picture Show. Artists Using Photography, 1960–1982 (exh. cat.). Minneapolis: Walker Art Center 2003, pp. 24–31.

[5] FLUSSER, Vilém. Za filosofii fotografie. Prague: Fra, 2013, pp. 48–49.

                                                                                                                


ALŽBĚTA BAČÍKOVÁ AND MARTINA SMUTNÁ / CARPE DIEM

-

Fait Gallery PREVIEW
Dominican Square. 10, Brno
28/1 – 13/3/2015
Opening: 27/1/2015 at 6pm
Curator: Martin Nytra

 
Carpe Diem: a dance on the ruins of a museum
 
Returning to the recent past is not unusual in the practise of contemporary art. The effort to cover the period immediately preceding their own lived experience has become an observed symptom of the art work of the generation that knows the reality of the normalisation era only indirectly, but grew up surrounded by its artifacts. The fragments of the past in everyday life miss their original context, are irritating by their nonconformity and therefore they provoke to a new interpretation.
The ceramics by Olga Hudečková was largely created at this time - in the 70s and 80s of the last century - and its relative availability in the stores of Dílo has made it a common decoration of households built in the times of real socialism. That is where our experience with her objects begins – by looking at the shelves in the living room. When visiting a gallery you can leave and forget, but the motionless presence of a strange object in the family household will gradually become a part of personal history.
Therefore, we went beyond the lines of our own past, but the generational gap was still kept in front of us. First, we regarded Hudečková‘s vases and candlesticks awkwardly, with a light touch of antipathy to the demonstration of a specific period taste. In order not to slip to quick resolutions, we firstly tried to understand the work in an historical context. The absence of any critical discourse from its time (there are available only a handful of non-critical articles in journals about applied arts and housing about the author) led us to search for a more current art history reference of her work. In the collected works about applied art the author’s name is not mentioned among the important authors of her time. In the collections of The Museum of Decorative Arts in Prague Hudečková is not represented, in the deposit of the Moravian Gallery in Brno only one vase, donated in 1984 by the Ministry of Culture of Czechoslovakia, rests. In the archive of Czech Television, you can find a few TV clips, but they are rather personal lyrical portraits, in which she always appears alongside her husband, the sculptor Miroslav. The main topic is always the tragic fate of the creative couple - a painful loss of both children. The materials we found spoke about the author's life, but not about her work. There is currently no clear institutional establishment approved opinion on Hudečková’s work. Maybe it's too soon, maybe she will forever be lost in the junkyard of the history of Czech normalization art. Because of the author being completely forgotten by history she is in our eyes a subject to which we relate much more personally. We visited the artist in her studio. In the interview, she avoids any judgements of her vases other  than through the 'timeless' aesthetic criteria. Neither is our request for a time indentification of each ceramic object fullfilled. They are all very similar to each other and Hudečková‘s memory fails to recall. In her studio, they are all together and therefore they together become a metaphor for a type of timeless zone that surrounds Hudečková - a metaphor for the grey zone for art works that are beyond any interpretation.
With our learned need to have a distanced look at our own work and its context, we face a completely different approach. The author's resistance literally "moves us out of our concept". Instead of abstract evaluation we rather try to reconstruct  Hudečková‘s world from the inside.
Martina Smutná starts to study formal components of Hudečková’s ceramic objects. She tries to find the roots of the morphology vases. She examines the the folds, that make folded flags from the objects, she explores the erotic (or a lyric?) crinkles and multiple layered plates. Martina's main interest is a vase from the 70s, that she always observed in her family household, just being on view, without ever been used. She tries to copy her in ceramics several times. Sitting behind the potter's wheel, where she competes with Hudečková in an uneven contest in which she fights not only with clay, but also with the perfection of the original. The heat of a ceramic kilns is swapped by the warmth of dissolved wax and the fear of failure becomes replaced by playfulness.
Menawhile I take the original of the vase from Hudečková into Prague's Museum of Decorative Arts, where they are about to finish the preparation for reconstruction of the historic building. A permanent exhibition of decorative art is already closed and the last show ends in a few days. The offices of the museum staff are emptied and collections are packed into boxes. The archives lie neatly packed in wooden boxes and wait to be moved. After many years of residence inside the museum the collections are moved. In the musem a turntablist Petr Ferenc puts the vase on a gramophone. It rotates in a circular motion, that, once in a ceramics workshop, allowed its creation. Gramophone records with recordings of Smetana's My Country from the years 1963 - 1990 serve both as a physical and musical background for the ceramic object. The musician deconstructs a pathetic melody of Vltava River and connects it to playing a vase itself. Instead of the nostalgic playing of records, that were in our home, always placed on the shelves of living room furniture, emerges edgy sound journeying across their circular tracks. Everyone needs to get out of their interpretative comfort zone sometimes, even the authors of what is in fact a slanted exhibition.
 
Alžběta Bačíková
On behalf of the authors

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