14. 6. – 31. 8. 2025
The public space of Litomyšl has been traditionally occupied by an open-air exhibition organized by the city gallery. Five curators – Ondřej Horák, Rostislav Koryčánek, Marie Straková, Žaneta Richterová and Tea Záchová – have collaborated with selected artists and, through site-specific installations and performances, highlighted the characteristic qualities of selected urban locations in accordance with their history and unique narrative of the past. The interpretation of the festival theme of passion within the framework of individual curatorial concepts is coupled with a shared desire to establish a harmonious dialogue with a specific place, rather than to intervene in its integrity in a disruptive manner. The project revives the general discourse on the topic of incorporating artwork into the urban exterior, whilst emphasizing its urban, aesthetic and ethical aspects.
Exhibition opening:
14. 6. 2025 at 4 pm, Monastery Gardens (as part of the opening of the Festival Gardens, followed by a guided tour)
EXHIBITED WORKS
Hynek Skoták
MDR, 2025
MDR is an acronym for the name of Magdalena Dobromila Rettigová – a native of Litomyšl. At the same time, it hides another anagram that will only be revealed to us after dark. The new exhibition space spread across three shop windows is located in Litomyšl on M. D. Rettigová Street and will commence its exhibition activities there in June 2025 under the auspices of the Town Gallery. The pilot project attracts the attention of passers-by to the new showcase gallery with its minimalistic intervention that lights up the darkness of the peaceful historical town – in which the bishopric once resided and where many important personalities, including Božena Němcová, Alois Jirásek and Bedřich Smetana, spent time.
The light-intervention by sculptor and conceptual artist Hynek Skoták, entitled MDR, responds to the peaceful nature of the city and to the cramming of the urban space with artistic artefacts from previous years. The gallery brings the spirit of the so-called alleys of love to M. D. Rettigová street: the red-light windows arouse curiosity, stimulate the imagination, while at the same time reveal nothing more about what is inside the ornate house at No. 118. MDR works with light in a very modest manner, with an exacting design framing the defined the area. The subversive nature of the installation urges us to ask question: Will there be a newly opened enterprise trading in pleasure here? However, MDR does not offer a clear answer and changes its character according to the time of day but shines most brightly in the dark.
Curator/ Marcela Straková
Location/ Smetanovo nám. no. 118
GPS/ 49.871188N, 16.310987E
Christof Zwiener
Out of the Blue, 2025
In the passage of the Na Špitálku Pharmacy, a work by Berlin artist Christof Zwiener breathes quietly. Out of the Blue’s presence is almost imperceptible – a sound installation whose rhythm resembles human breathing. As it gently inhales and exhales, the space turns into a living organism on the boundary between the audible and the overlooked. The inspiration was an unfinished composition by Vítězslava Kaprálová, whose diseased lungs are figuratively transformed into a source of life. Sound, air, memory and the body are all intertwined in the work, resulting in a subliminal meditation on vulnerability and restlessness. What initially seems to be random noise gradually sets both space and perception vibrating – as if the city itself was holding its breath for a moment.
Curator/ Žaneta Richterová
Location / Pharmacy Na Špitálku, Toulovcovo nám. 512 (entrance to the courtyard)
GPS / 49.871416N, 16.311394E
Jan Fabián
Washed Up, 2025
A conceptual artist and architect Jan Fabián has long been dedicated to the relationship between matter, space and being. His work oscillates between free sculpture, site-specific installations and architecture, while being united by a deep sensitivity to the environment and its internal connections. His approach reflects the search for ephemeral order — a kind of inconspicuous grouping of forms that only appears when we are really willing to look.
A characteristic feature of Fabián’s work is the recycling of temporary or found materials – wood, building remains, natural elements. Through upcycling, he transforms not only physical materials, but also ways of thinking about value, aesthetics and duration.
It is characterized by working with recycled, temporary or found materials – wood, building remains, natural elements. Through upcycling, he transforms not only physical substances, but also ways of thinking about value, aesthetics and duration.
Washed Up is an example of this poetic and at the same time environmental approach. This ephemeral island — partially submerged below the surface, partially visible — is a metaphor for hidden layers that only appear when we look at them with determination. It is like a reflection of our own selves on the surface: fragile and fleeting.
Fabián’s work thus not only stands on the border of art and architecture, but also touches on philosophical questions of presence, coexistence and sustainability. He creates a place that does not force attention, but rewards it – a place where the silent grouping of things and shapes can become an event that re-anchors us in reality.
Curator/ Tea Záchová
Location / Loučná River, Vodní valy Street (by Smetana’s bridge)
GPS / 49.870496N, 16.309530E
Prádelna Collective and Eva Jiřička
The Washing Stone, 2025
The Washing Stone project in Litomyšl is an artistic work of social criticism by Eva Jiřička and the Prádelna collective. The authors work with a mobile laundry van and an art installation that is intended to provoke dialogue on the use of urban space. While the number of people in need of housing is increasing, there is a lack of solutions. Instead, there is a growing trend of so-called hostile (or antisocial) architecture, which pushes people out of public spaces instead of helping them. Benches with armrests, spikes on windowsills, bollards in subways. These are not neutral elements, they are tools of exclusion. They speak of those whom we desire to eliminate from the city.
Public space is usually designed in such a way (for example, with street furniture) that it complicates the lives of the homeless or of those in social need and pushes them out of city centres. The authors’ installation is intended to be a symbol of helpfulness, sharing, and connection. It aims to literally connect the experience of homeless people and ordinary citizens. It will show that their common demands in public space are in fact a basic need for all of us.
While working together on the project, the creators ask themselves the questions: If we don’t see homeless people in the city, does that mean they aren’t here? Does it mean that the city is exception (like Litomyšl), or is it in reality more complicated? The Washing Stone project will offer an opportunity to consider these questions but also seek for answers to them.
Curator / Ondřej Horák (Fuczik)
Location / Corner of Vodní valy and Nerudova Street, near the Sokol Cinema
GPS / 49.868573N, 16.312394E
Tomáš Džadoň
Wandering Tradition
Tomas Džadoň’s log caravan, entitled Wandering Tradition, reveals the weak points of our freedom and unrestraint, which predestine us to the role of eternal nomads. Liberation and breaking free from the shackles of tradition and the straitjacket of social norms throw us into a vacuum, and closely following the initial euphoria, come nightmares in the form of lost identity and alienation. Are we condemned to an eternal search for drugs to sooth the resulting anxiety? To increase the doses of sought-after experiences and passions so that they drown out our elementary, yet insistent need to belong. At first glance, our quest for maximum mobility and the desire for permanence and roots could be fulfilled by a log cabin on wheels. In reality, this artwork is an allegorical vehicle of our longing and a questioning of the idyll of constant flexibility. Are we torn by these contradictions indiscriminately, or are there some places like Litomyšl where our pain from globalized homelessness can be soothed by a spa spring?
Open daily from 2 p.m. to 4 p.m.
Curator / Rostislav Koryčánek
Location of the work Wandering Tradition:
14. – 29. 6. 2025 / Mariánská 443 / GPS: 49.872403N, 16.311215E
30. 6. – 7. 7. 2025 / Smetanovo nám. 42, entrance to the garden from Vodní valy Street / GPS: 49.871413N, 16.309570E
8. – 20. 7. 2025 / courtyard of the Higher Vocational School of Pedagogy and Secondary School of Pedagogy, entrance from Smetanova nám. 21 / GPS: 49.872969N, 16.309297E
21. 7. – 4. 8. 2025 / Autocamp Primátor, Strakovská 1057 / GPS: 49.867924N, 16.322887E
5. – 24. 8. 2025 / Bernardka / GPS: 49.873476N, 16.307906E
25. – 31. 8. 2025 / Zdeněk Kopal Park / GPS: 49.8612564N, 16.3096694E
