Once upon a time in the east @City Gallery - art exhibition review
Submitted by editor.provokat... on Wed, 06/09/2010 - 18:44.
Once upon a time in the East (Tenkràt na Východě) - Czechs through the Eyes of Photographers, 1948-1989
By Kevin Calonne
From now on till 3rd of January, the City Gallery of Prague hosts well-known, forgotten and also hitherto unpublished photographs. From the establishment of the Communist regime in 1948 to its demise in 1989, photographers worked on getting in touch with everyday-life ambiance of the Czechoslovak population.
Photograph from Ivo Vodseďálek, Vysoké nad Jizerou, 1952, Fotobanka ČTK, černobílá fotografie
“This is not a political or an historical exhibition” . By settling on this assertion, organizers probably thought it was the best way to reach a broader, non-regular audience. Well after leaving The City gallery, regardless of the quality of the photographs, I had the impression this statement was a hoax!
Let’s be clear: social atmosphere, politics and especially history are at the core of this exhibition. Besides, stating the opposite is simply a lack of respect to the photographers’ work. Back in the early fifties many magazines vanished due to heavy censorship, however artists still found ways to unleash their creativity and express themselves. Even if publishing these photos was an unconceivable idea, photographers were still willing to give away their own testimony. So yes, when Josef Koudelka takes a picture of a man standing out in front of the crowd and throwing a stone at a soviet tank in spring 1968, undoubtedly, this is a political act. Yes, when Pavel Štetcha freezes a bleak glance into Prague’s population in the early sixties, obviously he seeks to delineate social despair back in the day! What about the gloomy picture from Jindřich Štreit of a despondent man witnessing life in the free world through the small TV in his bare apartment?
Does it mean these documents are not a relevant image of communist life at that time? Well, let’s stake on the audience's wisdom. Indeed, when a visitor wanders into the City Gallery, history as he has been taught is part of his background and thus his perception. To put it bluntly, he is continuously aware of his job contextualizing the works. In this exhibition, artists allow spectators to get thoroughly in touch with plain emotions such as solidarity, hope, despair or disillusion. Photographs don’t lie. They are merely providing us raw materials. And when I was viewing a moving shot of a defenseless Prague citizen who kept, in front of a soviet soldier, his finger on the trigger, his arms and mouth wide open … I swear I could hear him shouting out his fury.
Actually, I’m sure I did hear this guy screaming.
On the right side: Photograph from Gustav Aulehla, Během okupace, Praha, srpen 1968, černobílá fotografie
On the left side: Photograph from Václav Podestát, z cyklu Lidé z Porty, 1987, černobílá fotografie
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