<Muzeum Kampa presents the painter and glassmaker Vladimír Kopecký</Muzeum>

Vladimír Kopecký and Eva Jiřičná (2009)

Prague - The exhibition of Vladimír Kopecký, who moves between painting and working with glass, has been prepared by the Kampa Museum. It is called Storm and Calm, referring to the tension between the expressive colors of his works and the strict geometry that he follows in his creations. The exhibition focuses on key periods of his work, namely the second half of the 60s and the beginning of the 70s, as well as on works from the last ten years, including documentation of his realizations in architecture. The showcase will last until September 7.
    Vladimír Kopecký was born in 1931 in Svojanov in the Bohemian-Moravian Highlands and wanted to be a painter since childhood. However, after World War II, his family moved to Děčín. In the region, there were abandoned glass schools in Nový Bor and Kamenický Šenov, where the art aspirant applied - in Šenov, he met the young teacher Reného Roubíčka, and later in Bor, Stanislav Libenský, now a legend of Czech artistic glass. At the Applied Arts School, he attended the Studio of Monumental Painting and Glass under Josef Kaplický from 1949 to 1956. He also led the glass studio at this school from 1990 to 2008.
    The exhibition Storm and Calm aims, according to curator Martin Dostál, to draw the viewer into the emotional and aesthetic world of Kopecký's work. It mainly focuses on painting but also recalls spatial creations. Alongside works that utilize the optical qualities of glass, the viewer will also find objects expressively attacked by color. Kopecký's painting has its two great peaks, says Dostál.
    The first occurred from the end of the 60s to the first half of the following decade and produced distinctive spatial geometric paintings, often painted on a linoleum base. In 1970, Kopecký, through Jindřich Chalupecký, presented himself at an exhibition in Prague's Špála Gallery. The second remarkable painting period, according to the curator, has lasted from the late 90s to the present day and brings a series of abstract paintings, whose expressive strength, mastery of color material, and spontaneous gestural sovereignty place the artist in the global context of expressive painting.
    The exhibition also recalls, through photographs by Martin Polák, Kopecký's realizations in architecture, which the artist has been engaged in for a long time.