The exhibition presents the work of the 1960s generation, focusing especially on the Czech contribution to world art in the field of glass sculpture as an original path through modern art, one that was both linked to the creative ideas and experiences of cultural tradition and dedicated to uncovering new possibilities within the 20th century art.

Tomáš Vlček and Lenka Pastyříková are curators of the exhibition. The exhibition comprises of around 70 exhibits (glass plastics, plastics, graphics and photographic documentation) from the years 1958 to 1989 from Karel Malich, Stanislav Kolíbal, Zbyněk Sekal, René Koubíček, Stanislav Libenský, Hugo Demartini etc. The leading personalities of the sculpture of the sixties generation were trained as painters and designers and some studied in the glass studio of Václav Kaplický in Prague. They reassessed the traditional prerequisites of Czech art and sculpture, especially through their efforts towards clarity of shape and transparency of matter, together with an interest in the implementation of light in sculptural expression.

The exhibition will be festively opened on May 10 in the presence of the General Director of the National Gallery in Prague Milan Knížák and his economic deputy director M. Tejc. On the very same day a press conference will be held.

From the foreword of the General Director of the National Gallery in Prague Milan Knížák:

Sculpture has played an important role in Czech art since the Middle Ages.

Europe’s sculptural work of the past required for its existence a prosperous society. Statues were chiefly fashioned in traditional materials (wood and stone) and could thrive solely in milieus with a flourishing economy, which could afford such artistic indulgence.

During the 20th century, sculpture also began emerging outside economically-strong environments, even if for the simple reason that sculptural pieces had become reduced in size, were no longer directly dependent on craftsmanship and no longer served solely as complements to architecture or for sacral purposes. In addition, sculpture was making its way into home interiors. …

Czech sculpture dating from between the Two World Wars belongs to the most convincing. After the Second World War, this tradition was forcibly severed through government interventions. It was only in the sixties that distinctive sculptural work re-emerged.

Numerous artists were inspired by the country's glassmaking tradition and soon began to treat glass as a material suitable not only for the production of conventional utilitarian ware, but also of unique, one-of-a-kind sculptural objects. …

This exhibition presents a small survey of various types of Czech sculpture spanning the 1960s through the 1980s, charting the conceptual and formal wealth of the three-dimensional legacy of Czech art of the period.

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