Michal Blažek / Studio

14. 10. 2026 – 24. 10. 2026

MICHAL BLAZEK / STUDIO
curator: Dusan Brozman

Exhibition opening: October 13, 2026, at 6:00 PM
Performance by: Michal Pavlicek

Blažek’s Counter-Stance

"I believe—just as Palcr did—that spiritual life can only be rendered through figurative embodiment; one cannot attempt it through some form of objectification," Michal Blažek said in a 2000 interview with *Revolver Revue*.

This principle lies at the heart of the work and thought of the sculptor—who, from the mid-1980s onwards, was also an active figure in Czech spiritual culture. As early as 1989, while heading the Gallery of the Young (*Galerie mladých*) at the U Řečických house, Blažek played a role in the founding of the magazines *Respekt* and *Revolver Revue*, as well as the Civic Forum (*Občanské fórum*). Together with Petr Kofroň, he founded and published the magazine *Konserva/Na Hudbu*. While Kofroň oversaw the *Na Hudbu* section, Michal Blažek was responsible for *Konserva*, which focused on art criticism. Beyond what this context reveals about his political and intellectual outlook, the very name of Blažek’s magazine perfectly captures his personality:

He held sculptors such as Otto Gutfreund, Zdeněk Palcr, Miloš Chlupáč, and Zbyněk Sekal in immense admiration. All of them were figurative artists rooted in Cubism. Blažek loathed bad sculpture—and the "object" in particular, that symbol of contemporary culture—just as intensely as he loathed the Communists. And so, he pursued his conservative convictions with uncompromising tenacity until the very end of his life—both as a citizen and as a sculptor. Inspired by ancient Greek art, Blažek was convinced that a person could convey their experience of the world—that is, of the spiritual—only through the image of their own corporeality: their upright posture, their weight, and their physical presence. To use Zdeněk Palcr’s apt phrase, this occurred through a "bond with the base." Other concepts were also significant for Blažek: "life-giving quality" and "intoxicating plasticity."

Indeed, this was the title of the major exhibition of Czech sculpture—spanning from Gutfreund to contemporary works—that he curated at the Mánes gallery in 2005. Unlike a sculpture, an "object" lacks any anchor in human experience. It is inanimate—and thus devoid of life-giving quality and plasticity—so it cannot be considered a sculpture. It possesses no vital tension; it is merely an object.

Beginning in 1984, works titled *Protipostavení* (Counter-positioning)—a kind of politicized variation on *contrapposto*—were created in his studio on Haštalské Square. The cubist forms of the plaster and stoneware sculptures, from which the figure is composed, rise from a broad base upward toward the light. The individual planes and terraces of the sculpture catch the light in sharp reflections, which then transform into the living traces of the sculptor’s hand upon the vertical surfaces. Toward the base, the light gradually fades, giving way to darkness in the recesses. This is what Blažek’s updating of Baroque expressiveness and his embodiment of the spiritual world—themes central to his entire body of work—look like.

For over thirty years, he worked in an attic studio on Haštalské Square, situated above his parents' apartment, which essentially served as a studio space as well. Jaroslav Blažek, Michal’s father, was a painter and a native of South Moravia. Walking through the apartment meant passing by dozens of colorful canvases. Blažek—nicknamed "Haštal"—worked with a starkly different medium: a loose, snow-white material—plaster. Hauling stone up to the attic for carving would have been difficult. A fine dusting of plaster settled everywhere; he carried it on his shoes and sweater, and it coated the bag he used to transport books and magazines. Later, Haštal moved his workspace to the Letná district. The new studio was no longer on the top floor; it offered abundant light and the opportunity to work with other materials. Yet Blažek remained faithful to plaster, even though he enjoyed working with stone and stoneware at sculpture symposiums or at his country estate, Široký Dvůr, in Moravia.

The "Ateliér" (Studio) exhibition showcases works primarily from the Letná studio where this football enthusiast created his art. In recent years, some of his sculptures have become integral parts of architectural settings, and many historical monuments owe their sensitive, knowledgeable restoration to his sculptural artistry.

Nevertheless, the full significance of Michal Blažek’s work still awaits proper assessment.

Dušan Brozman