25 September 2015 – 8 January 2015
Pražák Palace - Moravian Gallery | Husova 18 | Brno | www.moravska-galerie.cz
Exhibiting artists: Barbora Kleinhamplová, Vojtěch Fröhlich, Lukáš Karbus, Pavla Sceranková, Pavel Sterec
Curators: Karina Kottová, Ondřej Chrobák
Architecture: Tomáš Svoboda
Production: Barbora Ciprová
25 September 2015 – 8 January 2015
Pražák Palace - Moravian Gallery | Husova 18 | Brno | www.moravska-galerie.cz
Exhibiting artists: Barbora Kleinhamplová, Vojtěch Fröhlich, Lukáš Karbus, Pavla Sceranková, Pavel Sterec
Curators: Karina Kottová, Ondřej Chrobák
Architecture: Tomáš Svoboda
Production: Barbora Ciprová
An international jury has selected five finalists for this year's Jindřich Chalupecký Award, the most prestigious Czech prize for visual artists. Twenty-five years after the death of Jindřich Chalupecký and the establishment of the prize named after him, the finalists were artists working in both classical media and conceptual art. They presented their works traditionally throughout the year and especially at the autumn final exhibition at the Moravian Gallery in Brno. The name of the 26th award recipient was announced on 20 November in Brno.
The five finalists were selected by a seven-member international jury, which, with one exception, was composed of the same members as last year. Holly Block, renowned curator and director of The Bronx Museum of the Arts in New York, was the chair of the jury. Other jury members were artist Jiří Kovanda, art theorist and director of the Slovak National Gallery Alexandra Kusá, Gunnar B. Kvaran, director of The Astrup Fearnley Museum of Modern Art in Oslo, art theorist and curator Pavlína Morganová and Marina Shcherbenko, curator and expert advisor at Bottega Gallery and Shcherbenko Art Centre in Kiev. A new member of the jury was the art critic and curator Marek Pokorný, art manager of the Ostrava PLATO Gallery and former director of the Moravian Gallery in Brno.
The finalists were Vojtěch Fröhlich, Lukáš Karbus, Barbora Kleinhamplová, Pavla Sceranková and Pavel Sterec. Fröhlich, Karbus and Kleinhamplová were in the final for the first time, while Pavla Sceranková and Pavel Sterec had already been nominated once. Throughout the year, they were presented in accompanying programmes in several locations in the Czech Republic and their participation in the Jindřich Chalupecký Award culminated in the Final 2015 exhibition, which was held from 25 September 2015 to 3 January 2016 at the Pražák Palace of the Moravian Gallery in Brno. The award ceremony for the 26th Jindřich Chalupecký Prize took place on 20 November at the Brno Philharmonic's Besední dům in the Moravian metropolis. The ceremony took place under the baton of the director Ivan Buraj, who is the artistic director of the HaDivadlo in Brno.
Vojtěch Fröhlich studied at FAMU and the Academy of Fine Arts in Prague, from which he graduated the year before. He works with the media of photography, video, installation and live events. He brings his spirit and body into challenging situations where he often physically confronts the very architecture of gallery spaces and literally and symbolically brings "outdoor" activities such as rock climbing or skydiving indoors. The resulting installation is then usually an expressive gesture. Whether it was walking on a rope stretched across the atrium of the Trade Fair Palace, transferring the colour of the sky onto the huge surface of the gallery ceiling, or recording the artist's climbing of the building in which the gallery is located. But the core is not so much the physical act itself as a liberating spiritual exercise. Fröhlich has participated in numerous exhibitions in the European context and in 2013 was also selected as one of the six finalists for the Berlin Szpilman Award.
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Lukáš Karbus graduated from the painting studio at the Faculty of Fine Arts of the Brno University of Technology. His work is largely influenced by rural life and work, miles away from the urban art scene, which the author touches rather symbolically, through not very numerous but nevertheless significant exhibitions in larger institutions and alternative spaces across the Czech Republic. Karbus's large-scale watercolours break from current trends, which is perhaps the quality that gives them their urgency. Their aesthetics seem to respond to modernist movements on the one hand, while on the other hand they let themselves be freely guided by observations of landscape and simple life, on the borderline of spiritual or hallucinogenic visions. They embody the classical qualities of beauty and craft, captivating in their sophistication and a certain amount of naivety.
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Barbora Kleinhamplová graduated from the Academy of Fine Arts in Prague the year beofre and represented the Academy of Fine Arts in the international Start Point award with her diploma work. She also studied at FAMU in Prague. Her work in the media of video, performance, photography and installation has undergone an interesting development. From her early actions, which usually featured the artist herself, placing herself in unusual positions, often interacting with everyday objects or the domestic environment, Kleinhamplová has recently moved on to question the position of the human being in contemporary consumer society, guided by corporate rules. She observes them in terms of neglected qualities such as sleep, hypnosis or the unconscious. During her studies, Kleinhamplová exhibited mainly within the independent Czech gallery scene, but her work was also beginning to appear in established institutions in the Czech Republic and abroad.
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Pavla Sceranková successfully completed her studies at the Academy of Fine Arts in Prague with a doctoral degree. She is one of the most outstanding Czech artists of the emerging generation. Her mainly sculptural work is based on the proportions of the human body and the aesthetics of everyday objects, which she transforms into playful, often kinetic objects and installations. Already here, her interest in structure and system emerges, which is a natural bridge to the exploration of the human position in a much broader whole: in the context of cosmic constellations, which are, however, in Scerankova's conception, "at the fingertips" of humans. She has already presented her work in respected institutions in the Czech Republic and internationally and has received numerous awards and scholarships. She appeared in the finals of the Jindřich Chalupecký Award in 2007.
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Pavel Sterec is among the finalists of the Jindřich Chalupecký Prize for the second time, the first time he presented his work in the finals in 2011. He studied in several studios at the Academy of Fine Arts in Prague and is currently a PhD student at the Photography Studio at the Prague UMPRUM. His work is based on personal or social encounters and situations, which he transforms into conceptual installations. These works combine an interest in the reinterpretation of mythical or ritual objects and natural phenomena in the context of contemporary thinking, as well as an engaged critique of the social and political status quo. Sterec has presented his work in a number of exhibitions, mainly in Central and Eastern European contexts, and has also participated in several prestigious residencies.
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Co-organiser: Moravská galerie v Brně
General partner: J&T Bank
Partners: Moravian Gallery in Brno, Trust for Mutual Understanding, Foundation for Civil Society, National Gallery in Prague
Financial support: With financial support from the Ministry of Culture of the Czech Republic, City of Brno Municipality, City of Prague, State Fund for Culture, Embassy of United States of America in Prague, Czech Centers, Stuchlíková & Partners, Fair Art
Media partners: Respekt, art+antiques, Artmap, Artmap, Artalk.cz
Special partner: Přítomnost
The exhibition and the catalogue are supported by the Ministry of Culture of the Czech Republic and the Statutory City of Brno. The general partner of the Jindřich Chalupecký Society is J&T Bank.
