Dedicated to Vratislav Karel Novák

Foreword

“Vratislav K. Novák is an artist who is difficult to classify. He seems to be at his best in the various liminal spaces in which he addresses and unsettles us. He is an artist of hushed and subtle disquieting.” Jan Sekera, 1993

The oeuvre of Vratislav Karel Novák unfolded in multiple directions. His domain was interior and exterior metal sculptures, small mobiles, and distinctive jewelry. At the beginning of his creative journey, he worked as a blacksmith and restorer. Since the early 1970s, he had mainly profiled himself as a sculptor, while the 1980s reintroduced him to the field of original jewelry, and he also became involved in design several times. The year 1990 marked the commencement of his long career as a university teacher.

He pursued all these areas almost simultaneously. His work betrays his admiration for form, motion, kinetics, mechanics, physics, and the interrelationships between various materials. The play with light and shadow, with sound, reflection, and the Surrealist metaphor of transforming shapes or purposes, as well as wit and exaggeration, were also significant to him. In his large‐ and small‐dimensional sculptures and jewelry, he often went to the edge of the possibilities of materials and construction elements ‒ but also the edge of the emphasis of the conveyed message and its effect on the viewer.