NG is organizing an international exhibition of contemporary art

Prague - The National Gallery in Prague (NG) today opens the International Triennale of Contemporary Art. The exhibition will take place in the Trade Fair Palace, where visitors will be able to see 18 curatorial projects from Tuesday until September 14. The theme of the triennale is Re-reading the Future, and according to the chief curator of the exhibition, Tomáš Vlček, its aim is to find a new interpretation of what contemporary art and contemporary culture are.
    The triennale follows two previous exhibitions held in 2003 and 2005, and given the planned two-year period, they were called a biennale. Subsequently, the NG decided on a three-year interval, and starting with this year's exhibition, it will be a triennale. According to the organizers, this year's triennale will have fewer curatorial sections, but the exhibition is supposed to give more space to individual artists.
    According to the organizers, the triennale also aims to showcase artistic tendencies that remain on the fringes of the mainstream of contemporary visual art. Of the 18 sections, three were prepared by Czech authors - in addition to the main curator of the entire exhibition and director of the Collection of Modern and Contemporary Art, Tomáš Vlček, the section was also prepared by NG director Milan Knížák. The third domestic curator is Lenka Sedláčková.
    The fact that the works participating in the exhibition have different characteristics is evidenced by the works of Jesper Alvaer and Isabela Grosser from Vlček's section. Their project "Representation of the Nation" is based on research into the state of the network of galleries associated under the Council of Galleries of the Czech Republic. They compiled a collection that includes interviews and statements from directors and curators of galleries and compares the state of institutional gallery activities in the Czech Republic and Europe.
    Part of the triennale will also be the project Mobility. Its aim, according to the organizers, is to connect young artists from the Czech Republic, Finland, Portugal, Poland, and Bulgaria, who will create artworks on assigned themes both individually and in a joint workshop. The main curator on the Czech side is once again Vlček, and his part is titled "The Theme of Mobility in the Work of Four Czech Visual Artists."
    NG also requested funding from the European Union for organizing the triennale and received it through the Culture 2007 program. This is a new program for cultural cooperation in the EU for the period 2007 to 2013, and "support for the international mobility of persons working in the cultural sector" is one of its aims.