The Applied Arts Museum will focus this year on hut architecture

Prague – This year's main exhibitions in the historic building of the Museum of Applied Arts (UPM) in Prague will showcase vases as a metaphor for human existence, the architecture of cabins, and also aristocratic garments. In the Cubist House at the Black Mother of God, an exhibition by sculptor and ceramist Jindra Viková will be held. The Josef Sudek Gallery will present photographs by graphic artists and painters from the early 20th century, including Alfonse Mucha and Viktor Stretti, starting Saturday. Today, museum representatives introduced journalists to the exhibition plan for UPM's 141st year of existence.

This year's main project is titled "Vase. Symbol of Culture and Life". The exhibition will take place from April 29 to September 6 in three museum halls and will be extensive, covering periods from the Neolithic to the present day. "We are dealing with the role of the vase in human history, its symbolism; we are not focusing so much on chronology or techniques," said curator Jana Černovská.

The exhibition's creator was surprised by how many symbolic connections the vase has. It serves various functions, from rituals and funerals to garden decorations. "It is not just a utilitarian and decorative object; it is a source of all metaphors and poetics," said UPM director Radim Vondráček.

The exhibition concept Cabin: Phenomenon in the World of Architecture was prepared by curator Adam Štěch from the perspective of modern architecture. The exhibition aims to showcase the cabin as a global phenomenon, not just a Czech one, since the 1920s, addressed by world creators such as Le Corbusier. It will focus on the development of the minimal cabin with minimal operation in connection with the housing crisis compared to representative buildings. Domestic creators such as Bohuslav Fuchs and Zdeněk Pešánek will be featured for their interpretations of cabins. The exhibition in the historic building will start on May 22 and run until September 13.

According to Vondráček, the museum counted around 158,000 visitors in 2025. "The main building had more visitors than in the year before last, as did the other sites," stated the UPM director. The most visited last year was the exhibition of photographs by Josef Koudelka titled Ruins. The museum also definitively acquired the Cubist Bauer Villa in Libodřice from Josef Gočár with the help of the Ministry of Culture, which was visited by 3,000 people in three months.