Martin Sladký, Mosaicist

The painter and mosaic artist Martin Sladký (1920–2015) was a prominent figure in the official visual arts scene of the second half of the 20th century; however, his work was never comprehensively presented before 1989, nor – for understandable reasons – at any time thereafter. It is only at this current exhibition that viewers can encounter his work for the first time. Although Sladký studied painting at the Academy of Fine Arts in Prague from 1945 to 1950, the focus of his work gradually shifted toward mosaics beginning in the 1950s, a medium to which he devoted himself until the late 1980s. Sladký’s work is closely linked to the era of state socialism and the system of state-controlled cultural policy, of which he was a participant and which he supported through his socially engaged works. However, his work cannot be reduced to its political content. Beginning in the 1960s, he sought to build on modernism and find his own artistic language in his paintings and mosaics. The exhibition presents Sladký’s work through paintings, photographs, mosaic fragments, and smaller variations thereof. In addition to the artist himself, it also highlights the now nearly forgotten technique of mosaic and its significant role in shaping public and interior spaces in Czechoslovakia during the second half of the 20th century.

Martin Sladký, Mosaicist -