Karlovy Vary Art Gallery

The gallery is a professional institution that has been preserving, evaluating and presenting 20th-century Czech art in the spa environment of Karlovy Vary and its region since 1953 in permanent exhibitions, short-term exhibitions, publishing activities and cultural and educational programs. During its existence, the gallery has gathered extensive collections of Czech art, of which the most important and valuable works are permanently presented in the number of about one hundred and fifty paintings and sculptures. The beginnings of modern fine art are presented in the moody, symbolist and realistic works of Jakub Schikaneder, Jan Preisler and Antonín Slavíček. The changeable and distinctive form of artistic efforts at the beginning of the century, in their orientation towards European trends – expressionism, fauvism, cubism – is found in the paintings of Josef Čapek, Emil Filla, Bohumil Kubišta, František Muzika, Antonín Procházka and Václav Špála. In the 1930s, they were replaced by surrealist expression, evident in the works of Jindřich Štyrský, Toyen and František Janoušek. The wartime atmosphere of the following period brought a new interest in man, the city and civilization. A very significant group of gallery collections includes works by Josef Istler, Václav Boštík, Mikuláš Medek, Zbyšek Sion, Jiří Valenta, Jiří John, created in the 1960s and expressing through various methods, from geometric, informal to fantasy and neo-figurative, the problems of human life. The developmentally multi-layered form of the permanent exhibition of Czech art is concluded by a collection of works by the 12/15 group and several important figures of contemporary Czech art - Zdeněk Sýkora, Karel Nepraš, Věra Janoušková, Olga Karlíková, Jaroslav Róna, Petr Nikl, Otakar Slavík and Stanislav Judl. The program of short-term exhibitions mainly follows contemporary artistic developments in various generational and artistic approaches and focuses primarily on Czech work.