Town Picture Gallery Refreshed
After a two-year reconstruction of Litomyšl Chateau, the Town Picture Gallery is returning to its roots and once again opening its gallery there where its long and complicated history began in 1925. At that time, the owner of Litomyšl Chateau, Prince Albert of Thurn-Taxis, provided exhibition spaces for the newly emerging gallery, and a year later, the newly founded institution was eventually able to officially commence its activities associated with cultural life in the town. Under the leadership of Václav Drbohlav, and later František Lašek, its position stabilized, and the gallery’s collection fund grew – not only quantitatively, but above all, thanks to numerous acquisitions and donations, also in terms of quality.
The present-day Town Picture Gallery is a place whose uniqueness lies in its symbiosis with the echoes of history combined with the unique chateau atmosphere and the revitalization of the exhibition spaces and facilities. The whole concept was carried out by the recently established Brno architectural studio MAAUS. The idea of a new beginning, in which however, the resolute desire to build on the gallery’s golden era of the late 1920s and 1930s, resonates, has shaped the curatorial intention of current and future exhibition projects held in the gallery.
This historical aura predetermines the Town Picture Gallery’s role as a platform for the presentation of the gallery’s collection of items, but at the same time, acknowledging the influence of current events in the field of visual arts, it wishes to open up to the world and contemporary trends. In the spirit of fulfilling this duality, a selection of Czech modern and avant-garde works is presented here this year, through which one can take a look at the art collection of the city gallery, as well as a large-format panoramic painting Ecce Homo by guest multimedia artist Daniel Pešta. The valuable core of the gallery’s collection, originating mainly from a gift to the city of Litomyšl in 1977 at the request of Josef Matička by his wife, Anna Matičková, finds itself in close proximity to a monumental painting in which Daniel Pešta depicts the theme of the systematic devastation of nature and concern for the fate of humanity, whose deeds inevitably lead to its own self-destruction.
The paintings from the collection, which are a visual record of the revolutionary process of shaping the new artistic language of the beginning of the twentieth century and contemporary artwork, thematically teetering between apocalyptical fantasy and realistically threatening reality, can be perceived separately or in a joint dialogue. As part of this debate, the collective conscience can then be confronted with a whole array of burning questions regarding the absurdity of the disparity between the often artificially inflated value of an artifact and the underappreciated importance of environmental protection.
The Town Picture Gallery
State Chateau Litomyšl
Jiraskova 93
57001 Litomyšl
Information
June-August/ Tue-Sun 10.00-12.00, 13.00-17.00
September/ Tue-Sun 10.00-12.00, 13.00-16.00
Admission
Full 80 CZK
Students, seniors 40 CZK
Free of charge (children under 18, holders of AMG, ICOM, ICOMOC, ZTP/P)
The town picture gallery could be realized thanks to the kind support of the Pardubice Region.
Are you interested in the stories behind the exhibited paintings? Click on the picture!
