Česká secese – Wittlich Petr (2020)

This Czech-language book examines the development of Czech Art Nouveau from the 1890s to the early 20th century. In Prague, as in Munich, Vienna and Berlin, a group of young artists broke away from traditional artistic structures to promote modern art. The Mánes Association of Fine Artists became the centre of this generational movement and, from 1896, published its own periodical, Volné směry. After opening its first group exhibitions in 1898, it became an essential representative of Czech visual culture. France provided the association’s main artistic inspiration, helping it overcome local nationalist interests, while figures including critic F. X. Šalda, architect Jan Kotěra, sculptor Stanislav Sucharda and painter Jan Preisler followed the international art scene. The struggle to fulfil the ideal of modern art revealed the full meaning of the term “secession” when the generation that followed Edvard Munch’s landmark 1905 exhibition in Prague provoked a crisis through its turn towards the latest developments in Cubism. This dramatic evolution is traced through three principal artistic directions: naturalist-Impressionist, Symbolist and ornamental-decorative tendencies. Although these were pursued separately, their mutual relationship gives Czech Art Nouveau a deeper artistic meaning and challenges the widespread view of it as merely an eclectic decorative style that ended at the beginning of the 20th century.