Miloslav Chlupáč / Paitings, sculptures, drawings

chateau Klenová 

30. 8. - 31. 10. 2020

Miloslav Chlupáč created sculptures, paintings, and drawings, and was an art theorist. He initially studied medicine, but after the Germans closed all the Czech universities, he began an apprenticeship as a stonemason. After the war, he studied under Josef Wagner at the Academy of Applied Arts in Prague. He also worked as a contributing editor for Kulturní politika magazine and was a leading member of the Máj art group, with which he exhibited in the late fifties. Besides acquiring a broad art education, he was also active in the areas of art theory and philosophy. His sculptural work and paintings were initially based on a Cubist vocabulary, but his distinctive style eventually moved towards mores simplified motifs, though without ever crossing into pure abstraction. In the sixties, he was invited to attend various international sculpture symposia. One important encounter for many Czech sculptors, Chlupáč included, was with the leading Austrian sculptor Karl Prantl. Chlupáč created monumental public projects both at home and abroad (e.g., Austria, France, Mexico). After the Soviet invasion of 1968, his moral principles and uncompromising political viewpoints prevented him from getting any new commissions, and so he retreated from the limelight and focused on painting instead. It wasn't until the eighties, as the totalitarian regime began to fall apart, that his situation began to slowly improve, but he did not fully return to public life until after the Velvet Revolution. He once again exhibited his works, attended international sculpture symposia, and taught at summer sculpture academies. His exhibition at Klenová Castle looks at his paintings, sculptures, and drawings, and offers an overview of his career: simple stone sculptures; still-lifes, landscapes, and figure paintings created with a Cubist vocabulary; and figural drawings, many possessing a romantic or monumental sensibility.