Karel HavlíčekHorla, 1955

Graphite and charcoal on paper

17.5 x 11.75 in

About the artist

Born 1907, Berlin, DE Died 1988, Kadaň, CS Born into a family of artists, Karel Havlíček studied law and became a lawyer - a career he did not like. He spent most of his life in Kadan, in northwestern Bohemia. He married and had three children. Havlíček worked for the Czechoslovakian government during World War II. The situation became emotionally and morally impossible for him, so he resigned, a political decision that marked him the rest of his life. He began drawing at this time as a way of exorcising his emotional and spiritual conflicts. Working only at night, he followed a ritual reminiscent of automatic practices. His drew without premeditation, spontaneously, as if overtaken by spiritualist production. After 1948, he was forced to leave his job in a ceramics factory where he painted dishes, and he became a laborer. In 1948, the Czech art critic Karel Teige, a major figure in the Czechoslovak avant-garde, became interested in him and planned to organize an exhibition of his drawings, a project crushed by the political authorities. This was a profound disappointment to Havlíček. He died before knowing the freedom that came about with the Velvet Revolution in 1989.

About the artist

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