The Pit

sound installation, wood, 225 x 200 x 50 cm, 2023

The pit reveals the life of the artist’s grandmother in the period between 2004 and 2022 in the form of an audio recording of her journal, in which she chronicled her daily activities on a farm in the village of Lubná u Poličky. Against the backdrop of a never-ending list of garden chores, outbuildings that need tending to, and events in the village, we perceive the burden of the routine activities and loneliness that are part of life in the countryside, and not only for older women. “The pit” is how Mrs. Hurychová refers to the place in the house where most of her activities take place, which the artist brings into the gallery in the form of a visual shortcut. The view of the courtyard through the “little gate” on the front porch is now replaced by a view of the busy Prague boulevard Národní třída, enhancing the contrast between these two worlds. The pit thus becomes a metaphor for the unavoidability of everyday life and for ways to, in the words of Mrs. Hurychová, “keep it from driving you nuts”.

text: Barbora Ciprová
sjch.cz

Hay, Straw, Dump, Jindřich Chalupecký Society, Václav Špála Gallery, Prague, 28 March 2023 – 3 May 2023

Takeaway

The Takeaway is an ongoing project that has been running since April 2020 and takes different forms of listening to urban surroundings, from clandestine eavesdropping to conducting workshops and listening walks. The listening platforms that have been created within the project—a headset, individual and collective listening practices—have the ability to activate listening and enable real-time processing of listening in an urban environment.

The website takeaway.place documents the past listening platforms that have taken place at various locations in different cities.

since April 2020

Silo 1

The Silo1 serves as a sanitation facility for residents residing in the Hen House. It is equipped with the kitchen, dining room, bathroom with the shower, and with the latrine. The Silo1 is a part of the project of 5Silos which is conceived as the five platforms made for cultural and educational activities of the Přespolni association. The silos formerly served as feed storage silos for cattle and they were determined to liquidation by the local cooperative farm.

garden, Lubná, since April 2019

WHY NOBODY WANTS ANYTHING FROM ME

The work focuses on subjective experience in urban and public environments. I use the principle of material and immaterial exchange as a medium for establishing communication, sharing my own thoughts and experiences with strangers who want something from me. I create the audio work from open and immediate communications with the others.
The original intention was primarily to relativize subjective diary notes. I let the diary notes read on the street by people who wanted something from me. Gradually, the reflections and experiences of respondents were added to the text. All readings were recorded and then post–produced.

Premedice - Radiocustica, ČRo Vltava, May 29, 2019
Basement Project gallery, Olomouc, May, 2019

Intimate tautology

This was the first exhibition that uses the entire capacity of the bag of the history of the VAK Gallery. It changes the spatial disposition of the object both inside and outside. It denies its functionality, thus shifting it from the position of a “walking” exhibition space to the position of artifact.
(shortened curatorial text of Aneta Willertová)

VAK Gallery, Brno, May, 2019

AND EVERYTHING IS LIKE A GREY ONE

I was recognizing Anette through her voice. I observed the characteristics of Anette´s voice through short spoken messages which Anette was sending me during two months. The spoken messages including phonetic details defined Anette her current mood. I have been studying the voice characteristics and then I wrote the script describing the phenomena taking place in Anette´s speech.

Brno, July, 2018

REVENGE

I let the guests enter on the opening of exhibition Something for something if they were able to strike me. I referred to the biblical story of Noah’s ARK, a way of selecting survivors who have been privileged to save themselves from the flood. I also pointed out invisible rules within certain communities and places

Kulturák ARCHA, Lubná, April 11, 2018

FOOTBRIDGE

Opening of the attic above the main ship of the Church of St. Cyril and Methodius in Prostějov.

Všem, Gallery Cyril, Prostějov, May, 2017

BEATS

I use the acoustic phenomenon of the beats for composing. The sound of the acoustic instrument (I.piano, II.zither, III.guitar) is supplemented by electronic additive synthesis detuning the instrument itself. Beats appear across the aliquots when the electronic signal collides with the sound of the instrument in the space. Originally played tones become a source of information expanding into the space.

January 2017
Odlet III./Noční směna, Cejl, Brno, February 2017 (+vj performance – tso – Markéta Wágnerová, video – Anna Tesařová)
Guitar institut, Brno, April 2017
(performance recordings)

NOTNEDVED'S BROTHERS

Revival project of the famous Czech’s folk band. Collaboration with my brother Zdešek.

Theater club Polička, November 22, 2016
Church of St. Cyril and Methodius, Prostějov, June 4, 2017
Široký Důl, July 16, 2017
Skalka pub, Lubná, April 7, 2018
Kulturák ARCHA, October 27, 2018
Theater club Polička, December 1, 2018

HENHOUSE

Hen House is conceived as a medium for engaging different generations, especially for the author of the henhouse and his grandmother who will initiate him to the principles of care of poultry. The object is designed as a luxury villa for hens as opposed to caged hen breeding and as a metaphor for the social differences of today’s society.
A quarter of the henhouse is used as a studio or residential place for the public, as an example of the earlier proportional distribution of the residential and farm part of the farmhouses. This simulation of past life at the village is transformed into contemporary architectural morphology, which should point out the dying farm tradition of the village and the coexistence of humans with farm animals.

garden, Lubná, May 2016, July 2017

WASHING MACHINE DRUM

Drum washer which was previously used for paper pulp washing reminds me of the ruin of the ancient baths complex. The cylinder set inside this ruin is analogous to the process of making paper and human cleansing in a thermal spa.
In the opening of the exhibition, the drum served as a podium for Three Cocks.

Project program, DIVUS Perla, Vranné nad Vltavou, April, 2016

FAIRY TALE ABOUT CAT MARGERITE

The animation was created on the basis of an improvised spoken fairy tale which I was telling to Eve before sleeping. So only two people had an idea of the fairy tale story in their own memory. I tried to create my own idea with animation and sound. I struggled with modern technologies and memory outages over time and effort to return to partial ideas which emerged at the moment of narration.

March, 2016
Project program, DIVUS Perla, Vranné nad Vltavou, April, 2016
Gallery Monomach, Brno, April, 2016

POLIČKA'S SKYLARK

Participation in the music bands competition of participation in the Poličské Rockoupání festival.
The Three Cocks and ÖSK bands was competing for the last place.
ÖSK lost/won.

Polička's skylark, Theatre club, Polička, January 30, 2016

ANGELUS

A fourteen-minutes track captures the ringing of the chapel in the Lubná village. I was making the field recording repeatedly during two months. Then, I made the stereo mix from the recordings in such a way that in the left and right channels are different days.

Lubná, January, 2016
HRAna, Gallery Off Format, May, 2017

RADIO ATTIC

The live performances of bands from festival Půda were broadcasted without awareness of the performers to our studio situated in another place. We were improvising with ongoing concerts in the studio and we were live broadcasting our improvisation back to the festival.

Festival Půda, Borová u Poličky, October 10, 2015

TEMPLE

Temporary conversion and cleansing of the space within the theater festival. Before the opening, a prayer was given and the interior was smoked by incense.

Festival Momentum, Theatre club, Polička, March, 2015

POOL

Projection of underwater world cuttings from Youtube videos onto the plastic/wall.

Environment of former warehouses - music festival Půda, Borová u Poličky, November 7, 2014

RAFT

Space on the surface/podium/sculpture. Week of cohabitation at three different places.

Synsky´s pond in Polička, Milovy´s pond, meadow in Borová u Poličky, July, 2013
Cooperation: Martin Karel Klusoň, Tomáš Paclík