2024-04-13 06:11:01
Book and graphic works created by the Czech painter Toyen in French exile are newly exhibited by the Gallery of Fine Arts in Ostrava. She bought the work for 2.2 million crowns last year for the collection. The collection includes 85 books, bibliophiles, book bindings and boxes or free graphic sheets.
“I think it’s the first time we’ve managed to collect Toyen’s works for a book from her Paris period, which are very rewarding and visually appealing for us. We couldn’t imagine until today how extensive the work was,” he said on the Akcent radio show exhibition curator Karel Srp.
According to him, the show, which will last until June 16 at the Ostrava House of Art, offers “an actually reversed view of Toyen, than the one we know from the classic exhibitions in Prague”. The biggest one took place in Prague’s Valdštejnská jízdárna three years ago, and was seen by over 40,000 people.
Toyen devoted her whole life to books in addition to painting. She designed covers, bindings and illustrations first for publishing houses in Prague, and after the war in Paris. The author moved to France in 1947 for political reasons, where she stayed and became a member of the Parisian surrealist group. “Essentially from the second half of the 60s, when she stopped painting, she devoted herself intensively to the book,” explains Srp, explaining how the artist stopped perceiving books as a source of livelihood.
She focused mainly on book covers and illustrations of poetry collections or theoretical reflections of her friends. These were often published in low editions as bibliophiles and many of them have not been preserved in their original condition. The fact that the Ostrava gallery has now purchased them may prevent them from being cut out of the books and further sold as separate original works.
In this type of work, the author most often alternated between dry needle and collage techniques. “The interweaving of these two techniques is interesting for her,” thinks Srp. He also points out that in Ostrava you can see Toyen’s very last works from 1978, which were never accented. “The collection we’re showing now has always been on the back burner because of her huge painting work,” he explains. Toyen died in 1980, she was 78 years old.
The purchased works in the Art House are supplemented by 12 graphic sheets, six books and four Toyen paintings on loan. They come from private collections and galleries European Arts, Galerie Moderna or Galerie Zdeněk Sklenář.
“Special shelves and plinths were made for the installation of books in the exhibition. Toyen graphic sheets, drypoints and lithographs are displayed individually. For safety reasons, flipping through the books is not allowed,” adds gallery spokesperson Jana Malášek Šrubařová. However, digital reproductions of the books can be explored on displays located directly at the exhibition.