The permanent exhibition of the Museum of Decorative Arts in Prague aims to present a vibrant, multi-dimensional image of European applied arts from the Middle Ages to the 21st century. The core theme focuses on art in the motion of life.All things around us enter into human life, accompany it, and transform it both functionally and symbolically. Art and design, thus co-influence lifestyles and the scenarios and models of human behaviour.
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The unbridled spontaneity of nature
Since antiquity, and especially since the Enlightenment and pre-Romantic 18th century, nature has become the "true school" and a teacher of art.
Life-giving forces balancing extinction and death
In applied art, the chaotic tangles of shapes, characteristic of Rococo creations, and natural bizarreness, anticipating the themes of the modern aesthetic of ugliness, aroused admiration.
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Calm and order
Biedermeier relied on the natural beauty of the material and simple shapes.
Harmony, balance, regularity
Biedermeier professed an ideal balance of proportions, regularity and harmony of shapes. He sought order and orderliness in nature. The main decorative element was the natural structure of the material.
Jardinière with glass inlay, c. 1900. AK & Cie, Vienna (c. 1900) by AK & CieMuseum of Decorative Arts In Prague
Mystical celebration of life
The demand for a return to nature affected the whole of society at the end of the 19th century. The shapes of plants and other organisms were admired for their living dynamism and perfection of form.
Dynamics of movement
The Art Nouveau turn to life and nature also led to an artistic exploration of the dynamics of bodily movement. The body was understood as a part and product of nature, as a carrier of life's stirrings and energies.
Louis Majorelle
came under the spell of the graceful vegetal forms of the Art Nouveau style. The entire set of dinning room furniture was purchased by the Czech entrepreneur Slavoj Grégr straight from the 1900 World Exposition in Paris.
Coffee service with flat handles (1912/1919) by Pavel JanákMuseum of Decorative Arts In Prague
Czech Cubism
The distinctive style spilled over into architecture and applied arts only in Bohemia.
The impressiveness of geometric order
The structure of the crystal fulfilled the artists' idea of a spiritual form. Therefore, it directly inspired some cubist objects.
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Abstraction of forms
Real shapes are reduced to the form of characters.
Abstraction - the universal language of modernism
Artists in the fields of glass, jewellery and textiles worked with traditional materials in a manner close to sculpture or painting.
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Amorphous - deformation and extinction
The life of forms inevitably tends to transcend all clear contours and boundaries of forms, to deformation and extinction. Thus, in this kaleidoscope of the visual world, we also encounter the phenomenon of the formless, the amorphous.
Supervision: Helena Koenigsmarková
Exhibition concept, specialized guidance: Radim Vondráček
Concept
Curatorial expertise: team of curators of UPM
Exhibition design: 20YY Designers, Petr Bosák, Robert Jansa, Tomáš Varga, Adam Macháček, Jakub Jansa
Photos: Gabriel Urbánek, Ondřej Kocourek
More photos on the museum's website
The museum is open Wednesday to Sunday 10am - 6pm, Tuesday 10am - 8pm, closed on Mondays.
Admission 350 CZK, reduced admission 180 CZK (students, seniors). Tickets can also be purchased online.
