The exhibition 70+70 commemorates the life anniversaries of Jan Merta and Josef Pleskot

Prague - The birthdays of two significant figures in Czech art and architecture, Jan Merta and Josef Pleskot, are commemorated by the exhibition 70+70 at the Zdeněk Sklenář Gallery starting today. Both have collaborated with the gallery, and at this exhibition, which will run until January 28, they meet for the first time.

At the seventh exhibition at the Zdeněk Sklenář Gallery, Jan Merta presents paintings completed this year that the public has not yet been able to see. His work is characterized primarily by the processing of his own life experiences and emotions. The exhibition also showcases portraits of people who inspire him – including works like Son (Form and Content) and Eleven Angles of David Lynch.

Although Merta only rarely responds directly to current socio-political events, as was the case with the piece Stockhausen's Symphony, this time the connection to the war is evident, whether in the former Yugoslavia in works like How Many Minutes of Silence? and How Many Minutes of Silence? II, or in Ukraine in the paintings Disintegration of the Post-Suprematist Cross, Grain Field, and Icon of Patriarch Kirill. The paintings Volunteer (Knight) and Freedom Leads the People raise the question of what and how to fight for, and simultaneously what and how to protect through struggle, for what to risk one's life.

The painting titled Karlheinz Stockhausen Conducting His Symphony Cyklon B was created by Merta about 12 years ago and responds to the controversial statement by German experimental composer Stockhausen made regarding the attack on the New York World Trade Center on September 11, 2001. The unprecedented attack, which claimed the lives of over 3,000 people, he referred to as the greatest work of art. Merta learned of Stockhausen's statement only after the composer's death in 2007. Nonetheless, he felt the need to address this event both artistically and personally.

Architect Josef Pleskot created specifically for the exhibition a silver circular object suspended from the ceiling that simultaneously descends and ascends, surrounded by five paintings by significant Czech authors of the 20th century – Josef Čapek, Václav Špála, Josef Šíma, Václav Boštík, and Antonín Procházka. Merta's work thus finds itself in a sort of anteroom to the hall of famous masters. "An architect's service: to make an entrance for a friend at the exhibition," Pleskot commented on the installation.

Pleskot also designed an architectural transformation of the gallery owner's study for the Zdeněk Sklenář Gallery and personally installed a traditional pre-Christmas exhibition titled My Dear Jesus – Laid Out. Pleskot has collaborated with the Zdeněk Sklenář Gallery for many years. Among other projects, he designed the modification of private but publicly accessible spaces in Litomyšl for the gallery.