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Atelijèur Půda

Too Many Teeth

exhibition catalog
Museum Kampa
2017

Czech and Slovak art of the sixties from the collections of the Zlatá Husa Gallery and Museum Kampa

The 1960s played probably the most significant role in the development of art after the Second World War.
By a fortunate coincidence it was during this time that a favourable political and social environment intersected
allowing the emergence of young creative individuals who had been supressed by the Stalinist era.
The same dynamics were present in music, film, literature, theatre and design, but also in the visual art and lifestyle itself.
All the period of 1960s can generally be perceived as the abandoning of conventions, the courage to experiment and
the desire for freedom and self-expression.
Obviously the situation in different parts of the world varied, but in general society irreversibly changed within a relatively
short period (what is a single decade in the history of a mankind?) and adopted opinions, attitudes and ideals that formed
the foundation of our world today.

The exhibition Too Many Teeth (whose title is based on that of painting by Eduard Ovčáček which expresses the essence
of everything that took place in the art of the 1960s) was present a view of the 1960s that is relatively unsystematic but all
the more colourful for that. It is based on two large private collections that were, from the outset, built up with the idea
of creating a more complex overview of the art of that period. Each of the collections comes from a different place — Meda
Mladek was directly involved in events of the 1960s and was personally acquainted with most of the artists whose works
are exhibited here. The character of her collection was determined by the limitations of transportation — not all of what she
personally wished to acquire could be shipped to Washington, D.C. where she lived and worked. Vladimír Železný, who lived
through the 1960s as a student with a passion for fine art, only began building his collection after the Velvet Revolution
— he knew the art scene and artists’ studios as well, since he visited them throughout the repressive years of the 1970s
and ’80s. Both collectors created unique collections that encompass everything of importance that took place in visual art
at that time.
Alongside main artistic trends, approaches and key authors of their collection, are included various ‘detours’, lone artists,
atypical works of art and a whole range of artistic peculiarities — all of which provides wonderful evidence of the colourful
life of that time.
Visitors were also see works by Václav Boštík, Stanislav Kolíbal, Milan Knížák, Eva Kmentová, Dalibor Chatrný, Jan Wojnar,
Zdeněk Sýkora, Jiří Načeradský, Mikuláš Medek, Věra Janoušková, Jiří Kolář…
And it is one of the first tributes to the 50th anniversary of the Prague Spring.
sekce: Catalogues