Offered by Galerie Latham
REQUEST INFORMATION
Pavel Krbálek (1928 - 2015) is a Czech sculptor, jeweler and painter, born into a family of blacksmiths, from fathers to sons, for seven generations. Between 1948 and 1959, they trained at the School of Art in Brno, then at the Academy of Arts and Crafts in Prague. In 1956-1957, he also studied at the Beaux-Arts in Berlin. His final work in sculpture, specializing in metal, marks a return to abstraction and appears transgressive in a country where communist realism was the norm. He began to forge his first copper jewelry during his studies. Wishing to make a transition from forging to goldsmithing, on the occasion of an invitation to exhibit with other Czechoslovak jewelers at Expo'67 in Montreal, he will develop an original forging technique at gold, which allows him to design “spatialist” jewelry as spectacular as it is refined, which will make him stand out during this first presence in an international context. The year 68 marked a turning point for the young artist, who had dreamed of living in Switzerland since childhood. As a member of the Czechoslovak Association of Visual Artists, he was invited to teach at the School of Applied Arts in Zurich, shortly before the invasion of Prague by Warsaw Pact troops in 1968. This is how that he finally decides to stay in Switzerland. He left for Lucerne, where he joined the Lucerne Circle foundation, created by a Swiss publisher who supported Czech writers persecuted by the communist regime.
In 1970, Pavel Krbalek's second artistic success: the Bavarian government awarded him the Bayerischer Staatspreis at the Handwerksmesse in Munich (Germany). During this decade and the next, the artist will teach in different art schools in Switzerland and Germany. He will also design some “spatialist” jewelry of very contemporary luxury for Gübelin, as well as for important personalities of the international Jet-Set. These creations are always unique because they are ergonomic, because they try to conform to the body shapes of each customer who orders them, the gold volutes being shaped according to her own specifications. “The prerequisite for creating a piece of jewelry is always meeting the woman who wears it! », declares the artist in a catalog of an exhibition of contemporary jewelry at the Bellerive Museum in Zurich in 1971 (Schmuck- Objekte. Golschmiede finden neue Formen, from September 24 to November 14, 1971). His jewelry will then be included in the most prestigious specialized collections of the time, notably those of the Schmuckmuseum in Pforzheim (Germany) and the Museum of Decorative Arts in Prague.
In addition to large-scale jewelry for fashion shows, Pavel Krbalek also designed jewelry for the theater. Through their graphic grace, all the design drawings of these body sculptures are also true works of art. Through this wired and aerial inspiration, Krbalek attempts to evoke in an abstract manner the profusion of feelings, the “inner” movements of humans, and the spiritual fervor which is at the origin of all cultural creation. He would also design more monumental forged and welded sculptures, decorative trellises and wall murals also using silver and gold. In particular, he developed a patented technology allowing him to print a shape memory on soft metal... After 1989, the artist lived alternately between Prague and Lucerne, managing two workshops and also resuming, in Miroslav, in Moravia of South, his birthplace, his father's old family forge, which had been partly destroyed in 1945. In each of these three places, the atmosphere and working conditions are different: this is why he will design at very diverse works during his fruitful career: in Prague, small sculptures, drawings and paintings; to Miroslav monumental forged steel works; in Lucerne precious metal jewelry…
In 1990, Pavel Krbalek received the prestigious Rodin Prize awarded as part of the Fujisankei Biennale organized by the Hakone Open Air Museum in Japan. Two years later, he also found himself a finalist for the Henry Moore Prize awarded during the same Japanese international exhibition dedicated to contemporary sculpture: in 1992, his monumental steel sculpture entitled Niké 89 was acquired by the museum. In 2000, he experienced the crowning moment of his multidisciplinary career: the Ministry of Culture of the Czech Republic awarded him its prestigious Artis Bohemiae Amicis medal. In 2002, a replica of the monumental Niké from Japan was inaugurated in Lucerne, offered to the city by the Czech Circle (with the inscription "Thank you from the Czechs to the people of Lucerne and to Switzerland for their help at the time when we Were not free"). This Circle of Czech artists exiled in Lucerne the following year, the same sculpture by Pavel Krbalek was installed in Chotkovy Sady, in the royal garden of Prague, at the foot of Belvedere Castle.
Exhibited in Japan, Switzerland, Germany and the Czech Republic, Pavel Krbalek is considered today as one of the major European sculptors of his generation, one of the great contemporary pioneers of artistic jewelry and " body-sculpture”.
