Milan Knížák

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Milan Knížák (2007)

Milan Knížák (born April 19, 1940 in Pilsen , Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia ) is a Czech performance artist and musician who organized the first Fluxus campaigns in the Czech Republic.

life and work

Milan Knížák was born in Pilsen in Bohemia as the son of the accountant Julia Knížáková and the painter, musician and mathematics teacher Karel Knížák. After the Germans were expelled from Czechoslovakia , the family moved to Marienbad on the border with Upper Palatinate .

Knížák began painting at the age of fourteen. His first exhibition took place in Marienbad in 1958. His early work was influenced by the painter and war veteran Vladimír Modrý (1907–1976).

In the early 1960s he turned to happenings and installations . Together with Jan Mach, Vít Mach, Sonia Švecová, Jan Trtílek and Robert Wittmann, he founded the artist group “Aktuální umění” in 1962, which was renamed “AKTUAL” in 1966. “A Walk around Novy Svět (New World)” and the “Demonstration for Oneself” from 1964 were early actions that took place in the streets and backyards of Prague. Spectators were passers-by.

Through Jindřich Chalupecký , Milan Knížák became a member of the Fluxus movement and, as George Maciunas claimed, in 1965 the “Director of Fluxus East”. He organized actions and concerts in the Czech Republic and in 1966 Fluxus festivals in Vilnius , Lithuania and Prague together with Ben Vautier , Jeff Berner , Serge Oldenbourg , Dick Higgins and Alison Knowles . In 1969 Budapest in Hungary followed and in 1977 a festival in Poznan , Poland .

George Maciunas invited Knížák to the USA in 1965. Three years later he had a visa and took part in Fluxus campaigns there. In New Brunswick , Canada he realized the "Lying Ceremony" and in New York City the "Difficult Ceremony". In 1970 he returned to Czechoslovakia . Some of his works are part of the collection of the museum FLUXUS + in Potsdam.

A DAAD scholarship enabled him to stay in West Berlin , where he met Wolf Vostell and Jiří Kolář .

Milan Knížák was director of the Academy of Fine Arts in Prague from 1990 to 1997 and was a professor there until retirement . From 1999 to 2011 he was appointed director of the Prague National Gallery .

Broken Music

In 1965 Knížák invented "Broken Music". Records were broken, stuck, burned, or scratched. He glued fragments of different records together to make new records, sometimes they were painted and then played.

The result of these arrangements was then recorded and released on record in the early 1970s.

Awards

Milan Knížák received the Czech Merit Medal in 2010 .

Solo exhibitions (selection)

Group exhibitions (selection)

Artist books / catalogs (selection)

  • 1965-86. Clothes painted on the body. 1987, Sprengel Museum Hannover
  • Actions, concepts, projects, documentation. , 1980, Olödenburger Kunstverein
  • Etwagedichte / Probable Poems / Asibasne. , 1982, self-published by Knizak
  • Liquid Silence , 1983, Edition Ars Viva / DAAD
  • 1953 1988 - Porádá Dum umeni mesta Brna , 1989, Gallery Benedikta Rejta
  • Flight feeling , 1991, Akademie Schloß Solitude
  • Liebliches Trauma with Jürgen Goertz , 1994, exhibition catalog exhibition Reichstag building
  • Actions , 2000, Gallery, spol. s ro (Jaroslav Kořán)
  • Písně kapely Update , 2003, vyd. MAŤA
  • Encyklopedie výtvarníků loutkového divadla v českých zemích a na Slovensku od vystopovatelné minulosti do roku 1950 , 2005, Nucleus HK
  • One Hundred Works of the National Gallery in Prague , 2006, National Gallery Prague

Sound carrier (selection)

  • Broken Musik , LP, Multhipla Records
  • Broken Musik , MC, 7inch, Edition Hundertmark
  • Broken Musik , Flexi, DAAD artist program in Berlin
  • Obřad Hořící Mysli , DoLP, Condor
  • Navrhuju Krysy , CD, Anne Records
  • Fluxus (answering machine music) with Commissioner Hjuler , LP, Psych.KG
  • Petition for student protest with Mama Baer and Commissioner Hjuler , LP, Psych.KG
  • String Quartets CD, Sub Rosa

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Milan Knížák accessed on September 21, 2014 (English).
  2. ↑ Museum Fluxus + Modern and Contemporary Art Milan Knížák ( Memento of the original from September 24, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link has been inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , accessed on September 21, 2014. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.fluxus-plus.de
  3. ↑ Fluxus East-Fluxus Networks in Central Eastern Europe- Milan Knížák accessed on September 21, 2014 (English).
  4. ^ Potsdam Museum Fluxus + , accessed on May 15, 2020
  5. ^ Archives Broken Music & Milan Knížák. 19.3.-10.5.2014. Yellow music. Maerzmusik festival for contemporary music accessed on September 21, 2014 (English).
  6. ↑ October 29, 2010, Christian Falvey: Highest state awards given to twenty-two outstanding men and women, accessed on September 21, 2014 (English).
  7. ↑ central European database Milan Knížák accessed on September 21, 2014 (English).
personal data
SURNAME Knížák, Milan
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Czech performance artist and musician
DATE OF BIRTH April 19, 1940
PLACE OF BIRTH Pilsen , Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia