The Moravian Gallery will make available the archive of graphic designer Rajlich

Brno - The Moravian Gallery in Brno will provide public access to the archive of graphic designer Jan Rajlich Sr. and is preparing a comprehensive exhibition of his lifelong work. It will open in 2020, marking 100 years since Rajlich's birth. Jan Press, the gallery director, announced this today on the occasion of the opening of the International Biennial of Graphic Design in Brno.

Rajlich passed away in 2016 at the age of 96. Today, the organizers of the biennial announced that they have awarded Rajlich posthumously with a prize for his contributions to the field. Rajlich was the founder and long-time organizer of the biennial, leaving behind a substantial archive that the gallery has expressed interest in.

"For us, it was somewhat surprising that the Moravian Gallery did not have this archive until now," said Press. According to him, the gallery will partially purchase the archive from the family and will receive some of it as a gift. "We would like the archive not to be fragmented, but to remain together," Press stated.

In the following year and a half to two years, the gallery intends to complete a comprehensive monograph on Rajlich. The exhibition planned for 2020 will summarize his lifelong contributions. The gallery will also make Rajlich's archive available via the internet.

A pioneer and promoter of Czech graphic design and one of the first advocates of a unified visual style for institutions and companies, he started out as a painter. "Then I realized that so many pictures have already been painted around the world that adding anything more is pointless, so I stopped painting altogether for a time, even though I was quite successful," Rajlich said years ago in an interview with ČTK.

Later, he designed posters, graphic layouts for books, artistic concepts for exhibitions and trade show displays, small promotional graphics, as well as relief objects, on which he collaborated with architects. Rajlich's significant pedagogical and organizational activities are also noteworthy.