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House of Art
TUES–SUN 10:00–18:00

Sebastian

2002

photograph, gelatin silver print, 500 × 400 mm

purchased in 2019 with support from the Czech Republic Ministry of Culture

Pinkava’s oeuvre moves on the boundary between portraits and nudes. He chooses models with atypical body structure or facial physiognomy, imbuing his photographs with an almost trans-personal dimension. He often depicts androgynous types. The atypical nature of his models, and their “damaged beauty” (Martin C. Putna), enables him to shift interpretations into the domain of comments on traditional Biblical and ancient themes, archetypical figures, or fateful relationships. Pinkava is also known for his photographic portraits of well-known figures from the arts; his photograph of the poet J. H. Krchovský is literally iconic. The controlled stylization and poses of Pinkava’s models are inspired by historical portraiture from the Renaissance, Baroque or Mannerist eras, so his oeuvre can be viewed through a contemporary prism as a form of post-production.

The other main facet of Pinkava’s work encompasses his still lifes, which thematize the transience of beauty and life in general; he himself describes these photographic concepts as “Vanitas”. However, this transience is paradoxically set within a form of timeless light and space, wrenched out of the context of tangible existence. This convolute of photographs by Ivan Pinkava is an important example of Czech staged photography.


PINKAVA IVAN

(*1. 2. 1961, Náchod) Photographer. Pinkava studied artistic photography at the Film and TV School of the Academy of Performing Arts in Prague (1981–1986). He is a co-founder of the Prague City Gallery’s Photography Centre. From 2005 to 2007 he headed the photography studio at the Prague Academy of Arts, Architecture and Design. He has contributed to group exhibitions since the late 1980s, and has displayed his works at solo exhibitions since 1990. His photographs are represented in the collections of numerous important institutions in the Czech Republic and abroad, including the Bibliothèque Nationale de France (Paris), the Victoria & Albert Museum (London), the Maison Européene de la Photographie (Paris), the National Gallery (Prague), the Museum of Art (Olomouc), and the Moravian Gallery (Brno). In 2004 Prague’s Rudolfinum gallery held a major retrospective of Pinkava’s work entitled Heroes (including a catalogue of the same name).
photograph, gelatin silver print, 940 × 680 mm, purchased in 2019 with support from the Czech Republic Ministry of Culture
2013

Untitled

photograph, D print on Portfolio Rag, 430 × 320 mm, purchased in 2019 with support from the Czech Republic Ministry of Culture
2018

Without disrupting contexts

photograph, gelatina silver print, paper, 635 × 960 mm, 320 × 430 mm
2010

Dogma

photograph, gelatin silver print, 190 × 280 mm, purchased in 2019 with support from the Czech Republic Ministry of Culture
2008

Bed I

photograph, gelatin silver print, 190 × 280 mm, purchased in 2019 with support from the Czech Republic Ministry of Culture
2008

Bed II

photograph, gelatin silver print, 380 × 500 mm, purchased in 2019 with support from the Czech Republic Ministry of Culture
2005

Untitled

photograph, D print on Portfolio Rag, 430 × 320 mm, purchased in 2019 with support from the Czech Republic Ministry of Culture
2016

Untitled

Girl in a fur

Girl in a fur

undated
Old Eroticism

Old Eroticism

1996
Concrete (Below a Slag-Heap)

Concrete (Below a Slag-Heap)

1983
Wallachian Madonna

Wallachian Madonna

1921
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