Provider and number: Ministry of Culture of the Czech Republic NAKI III DH23P03OVV014
Duration: 2023–2027
Recipient/s: Institute of Art History, CAS and National Heritage Institute
Principal investigator: Eva Janáčová
Research team: Eva Janáčová, Jakub Hauser, Daniel Polakovič, Blanka Soukupová, Iva Steinová, Markéta Svobodová, Zbyněk Tarant, Petra Vladařová, Aleš Homola, Jana Oberreiterová, Petra Šternová, Zuzana Duchková
The aim of the project is a professional evaluation of the topic of Holocaust monuments and memorials in Bohemia, Moravia and Silesia, and a post-war reflection on the Holocaust in fine art from the end of World War II until today. The project presents the changing forms and functions of monuments and memorials by using various methodological and theoretical approaches. It not only follows the visual aspects, but also deals with changing minority identities and their influence on monument creation, and in a wider perspective on the individual, collective and cultural memory of the Holocaust and its projection into specific monuments and works of art. The relationship of events to specific places, urban and rural, and the way the monuments deal with the memory of these places will be prioritised. The circumstances in which the monuments originated will make it easier to reveal political and social contexts in different stages of local history from the first post-war years to the present. Some projects can be followed as they originate in real time (Memorial to Silence in Prague – Bubny; Lety Memorial near Písek). The project links the theme of memorials with the way experiences of the Holocaust project themselves into artistic expression in various visual media – not only because related interfaces exist between these fields but also because the two are essentially inseparable (e.g., many realisations by Aleš Veselý; Memorial in the Pinkas Synagogue in Prague). Until now, hardly any attention was devoted to the theme of monuments and memorials, nor to the reflection of the Holocaust in fine art. The project will be the first such initiative to present the theme across the media, presenting major outputs in the form of two exhibitions accompanied by specialised catalogues, two conferences, a professional collective monograph, a specialised public database and interactive maps.
