Fotograf Magazine

1936: Photography and /history/ Structuralism on a Date in Prague

‘In the tendency to liberate the sign from the object […] one sees the decisive striving of all new art, which appears as the antithesis of naturalism.’ Roman Jakobson¹

In the mid-1930s, the Mánes Association of Fine Artists (Spolek výtvarných umělců Mánes, hereafter SVU Mánes) made a significant attempt to attract greater attention to modern photography…

Rudolf Skopec

Rudolf Skopec: Photographer, Historian, Teacher and Collector. This year marks the 90th anniversary of the birth of Rudolf Skopec, one of the legends of Czech photography. Skopec was born on July 7th 1913 in Velké Meziříčí into a photographer’s family, and he later apprenticed in the family’s studio…

The Witness Pavel Štecha >

The photographer and FAMU professor Pavel Štecha (20. 12. 1944 – 19. 7. 2004) was well-known and much sought after as a professional, able to illuminate and to convey the spirit of photographed phenomena uncommonly well…

Zdeněk Tmej: Story without a Happy Ending

The Prague-born Zdeněk Tmej (5. 7. 1920 – 22. 7. 2004) lost his father at 7, and soon afterwards also the financial security afforded by the family’s large tailor’s shop, which his mother was unable to maintain…

The american dream of Alexander Hammid

“If we consider the cinema as a means of mass communication we must realize also the contradiction between the anonymous masses and the personal intimacy that occurs between the screen and every individual in the audience…

The Primer of Postmodernism: Josef Sudek

The charm of all lies in mysteriousness.

/josef sudek/

Josef Sudek (1896–1976) remains the most widely published Czech photographer. He was so unmistakeably original that it would be an exercise in futility to look for creative parallels in his contemporaries…

Déja vu

Even though the history of documentary photography is generally well- known in many aspects, it still calls for a fresh evaluation. In documen- tary photography, cultivated by an awareness of the painting of occasional scenes in the history of art, understanding of both the shifts in aesthetics and in the perception of the genre by society are essential…

storm in a glass-house

The Czech-American, Drahomír Josef Růžička (1870-1960) has gone down in the annals of Czech photography as a figure of great importance. As late as the mid-1960s his estate prompted the following lines: ”Until now, Růžička was ranked in the history of Czech photography above Drtikol, since his influence on younger artists was more direct…

photograph with an enigma

This impromptu shot is among the most notorious items of the archive of the Czech Press Agency. It is impossible to count the times it has been published to date. There was even a television documentary miniseries that sought out the persons involved and presented their subsequent experiences…

Realism raised to the metaphysical

A cycle of hunting lodges photographed over a long period of time commemorates the centennial of the birth of Rudolf Janda (15 October 1907 – 26 September 2000). Janda achieved recognition above all as a photographer of virgin forests, publishing two albums on that theme…

The mystery of Josef Sudek: between styles

“… it is the task of the individual, in fact, to stand on one’s own two feet, distinct from all others. Obstacles in the way to fulfilling this task are all collective identities, such as membership in organizations, the profession of -isms, and the like…

Idols modeled by men

Why is it that photographs of figures in a state of undress so often strike us as kitsch, that is, as “a sleek image untouched by the divine inspiration of art”?[ref]Váša, P., Trávníček, F…

The Splendeurs et Miséres of the Hinges of Historiography

The rise of the international movement of photo-amateurs is often evoked more or less as the movement originally envisioned itself. Quotes from the standard Czech bibliography illustrate the enthrallment of historians with these bygone intentions of yore, and therefore the present text offers a re- -focusing of this retrospective point of view…

1980’s Fashion – What Was it Like?

Given the continuing lack of freedom during the decade, the picture of Czech fashion of the 1980’s likewise appears less then free, and yet it was still the most prolific period of the post-war era…

Confronting History

Though the sense of being an old-timer had been gradually creeping up on me, the full force of this realization hit me in one fell swoop. Projects such as the exhibition Česká malba generace 80…