Sudek, Funke, Drtikol… Czech and Slovak photography from the PPF collection is now ending. The 131 photographs, originally selected to mark the centenary of the founding of Czechoslovakia, will remain on display at the Regional Gallery in Liberec until 30 September 2018. “The exhibition was held over the summer, when the high temperatures made going swimming more appealing than going to art galleries. Even so, we’ve had 10,267 visitors in less than three months,” says the Director of the Regional Gallery in Liberec, Jan Randáček. This exhibition, presenting an overview of photography’s chronology from the mid-19th century to the present day, has attracted great interest, and it has been positively received by experts and the general public alike. Over 250 people attended the opening, and more than 170 people have enjoyed guided tours of the exhibition this summer.
“The present exhibition at the Regional Gallery in Liberec is the most extensive exhibition from our collection to date, and this isn’t the last time people can see such a broad range of work,” says PPF Art’s Managing Director, Jan Řehák, adding that galleries in Augsburg in Germany and Wroclaw and Krakow in Poland have expressed their interest in hosting the exhibition. “The Czech ambassador to the United Kingdom, Libor Sečka, also visited the Sudek, Funke, Drtikol… exhibition at the Regional Gallery in Liberec, and thanks to him we are now negotiating a possible exhibition of Czech and Slovak photographs in Edinburgh in 2020,” Jan Řehák adds. “This is the first time we’ve had such a large exhibition of photographs, and I’m delighted it’s going to be reprised in other countries, because that shows the quality of the photographs on display, and the quality of the concept for the exhibition too,” says Jan Randáček. Czech and Slovak photographs had already captured the imagination of artists from other countries – Richard Gere, a great admirer of Sudek’s work, came to another exhibition of photographs from the PPF collection. There was also an exhibition at the Douglas Hyde Gallery in Dublin, which showed a selection of Josef Sudek’s photographs from the PPF collection to mark the 120th anniversary of his birth, and it attracted a lot of attention in Ireland.
In July and August the Regional Gallery in Liberec also catered to the youngest generation, and there was great interest in all three photography camps it organised in the city. At these camps children worked with Polaroid cameras and also tried out other photographic techniques. “Each camp ended with an improvised exhibition and an auction of the photographs produced, so the children not only took photographs but also found out what it was like to show their work to the public,” says Jan Randáček. With its fine exhibitions and events for both children and adults, the Regional Gallery is constantly winning new fans.
Sudek, Funke, Drtikol… Czech and Slovak photography from the PPF collection at the Regional Gallery in Liberec will finally close at 5 p.m. on Sunday 30 September.