The new curator of the House of Art in České Budějovice will be Kristýna Hájková

Ceske Budejovice - The new curator of the Gallery of Contemporary Art and Architecture in the House of Art in Ceske Budejovice will be Kristyna Hajkova starting October 1. The city mayor Dagmar Skodova Parmova (ODS) announced this to CTK today. The city was choosing between two candidates, the other being curator Jiri Ptacek. The current curator Michal Skoda has decided to end his tenure due to disagreement over the postponed reconstruction of the building. The House of Art was part of the concept for Ceske Budejovice as the European Capital of Culture 2028. It is funded by the city.

"Kristyna Hajkova will be an employee of our cultural and sports facilities. Together with Michal Skoda, they will operate until the end of the current year. They will prepare the gallery's operation for the upcoming period," said Skodova Parmova.

Hajkova has been engaged in curating since 2019, focusing on conceptual art, sculpture, new media, and spatial installations. She is studying in a doctoral program at the Faculty of Art and Design at Jan Evangelista Purkyne University in Usti nad Labem. She has prepared or participated in exhibitions for, among others, the Gallery of the Capital City of Prague, the houses of art in Brno and Usti nad Labem, the Gallery of Emil Filla in Usti nad Labem, and the international festival of contemporary art 4+4 Days in Motion.

Hajkova has worked as an independent curator and applied for the selection process of the Ceske Budejovice city hall because she wants to lead the entire curatorial concept and have the opportunity to develop it over several years, she told CTK. She intends to build on the program that the gallery had in the past, namely contemporary art and architecture.

"A slight change will be that each year will focus on a specific theme, and thus the exhibitions will be part of a broader cycle. In the following year, we will focus on the phenomenon of public space, in 2027 on collective memory, and in 2028 I would like to connect it with the fact that Ceske Budejovice will be the Capital of Culture, so I wanted to link a bit to the theme of permaculture," said Hajkova.

She wants to organize her first exhibition in the House of Art in Ceske Budejovice next spring, which will feature a foreign author, although she has not revealed her name yet. She would also like to collaborate with local institutions, the Faculty of Philosophy, the South Bohemian Theatre, or the group around the European Capital of Culture 2028.

Michal Skoda has prepared the last exhibition for autumn, which will have its opening this Thursday and will present the works of the architectural studio Maly Chmel, including the winning design for the reconstruction of the House of Art. The studio designed it in collaboration with the Berlin studio AFF Architekten. "The Gallery of Contemporary Art and Architecture more or less ends with me, and it will build a new gallery from scratch," Skoda told CTK.

Ceske Budejovice has commissioned a study that is supposed to determine what spaces for visual arts the city has and which need to be repaired. "I expect that we will present the final form of the study to both the cultural commission and the city council at the November meeting," said Skodova Parmova, who previously stated that the city plans to reconstruct the House of Art by 2030.