Adriena Šimotová (1926–2014) was a prominent Czech artist. Known for her work with paper and fabric, she held numerous exhibitions in the

Czech Republic The Czech Republic, also known as Czechia, and historically known as Bohemia, is a landlocked country in Central Europe. The country is bordered by Austria to the south, Germany to the west, Poland to the northeast, and Slovakia to the south ...

and abroad during her lifetime including a retrospective organized by the

National Gallery The National Gallery is an art museum in Trafalgar Square in the City of Westminster, in Central London, England. Founded in 1824, it houses a collection of more than 2,300 paintings dating from the mid-13th century to 1900. The current di ...

in Prague in 2001.

Biography

Šimotová graduated from the

Academy of Arts, Architecture and Design in Prague The Academy of Arts, Architecture and Design in Prague (AAAD, , abbreviated VŠUP, also known as UMPRUM) is a public university located in Prague, Czech Republic. The university offers the study disciplines of painting, illustration and graphics, ...

. Her early work of the 1960s was exhibited at venues including the

Václav Špála Gallery The Václav Špála Gallery (Czech: Galerie Václava Špály) is a Prague gallery of mostly contemporary art. It is located at no. 59/30 Národní třída, in the New Town of Prague (Praha 1 – Nové Město). The gallery holds exhibitions particu ...

and the

Sao Paulo biennial SAO or Sao may refer to: Places * Sao civilisation, in Middle Africa from 6th century BC to 16th century AD * Sao, a town in Boussé Department, Burkina Faso * Serb Autonomous Regions (''Srpska autonomna oblast'', SAO), during the breakup of ...

. She was a founding member of the Czech art group UB 12, along with

Václav Boštík Václav Boštík (6 November 1913 – 7 May 2005) was a Czech painter, graphic artist and illustrator. Career In 1937, he joined the Academy of Fine Arts in Prague, Academy in Prague and from 1942, he was a member of the ''Umělecká besed ...

Stanislav Kolíbal Stanislav Kolíbal (born 11 December 1925) is a Czech artist and sculptor. Work His work is counted among the fundamentals of modern Czech art. Since the 1950s, Stanislav Kolíbal has been one of the most notable personalities on the Czech art s ...

, and others. After her husband's death in 1972, she shifted her artistic focus away from painting and began to use fabrics and sculptural installations. Due to the Czech Republic's political circumstances in the 1970s and 1980s, much of Šimotová's work at the time was shown on an unofficial basis or subject to censorship. Šimotová received the French honor the

Ordre des Arts et des Lettres The Order of Arts and Letters () is an order of France established on 2 May 1957 by the Minister of Culture. Its supplementary status to the was confirmed by President Charles de Gaulle in 1963. Its purpose is the recognition of significant ...

in 1991 and the Czech Medal of Merit in 1997. In 2000, she received the

Herder Prize The Herder Prize (), named after the German philosopher Johann Gottfried Herder (1744–1803), was a prestigious international prize awarded every year from 1964 to 2006 to scholars and artists from Central and Southeast Europe whose life and wor ...

. Today, several of her works are held in the permanent collection of the

Centre Georges Pompidou The Centre Pompidou (), more fully the (), also known as the Pompidou Centre in English and colloquially as Beaubourg, is a building complex in Paris, France. It was designed in the style of high-tech architecture by the architectural team of ...

. She received an honorary doctorate from the

in 2007. Šimotová died in 2014 at the age of 87.

Collections

National Gallery in Prague The National Gallery Prague (, NGP), formerly the National Gallery in Prague (), is a state-owned art gallery in Prague, which manages the largest collection of art in the Czech Republic and presents masterpieces of Czech and international fine a ...

Galerie Rudolfinum The Rudolfinum is a building in Prague, Czech Republic. It is designed in the neo-Renaissance style and is situated on Jan Palach Square on the bank of the river Vltava. Since its opening in 1885, it has been associated with music and art. C ...

Museum Kampa Museum Kampa is a modern art gallery in Prague, Czech Republic, showing Central European, and in particular Czech work. The pieces are from the private collection of Meda Mládek, wife of Jan V. Mládek. The museum opened in 2003 and is housed in ...

References

External links

Profile at Galerie U Betlémské

Images from the series ''A Touch of Colour – The Assumption''

Short documentary featuring Šimotová
- in Czech {{DEFAULTSORT:Šimotová, Adriena 20th-century Czech painters Czech graphic designers 21st-century Czech painters 20th-century Czech printmakers 21st-century Czech printmakers Czech women graphic designers 1926 births 2014 deaths Academy of Arts, Architecture and Design in Prague alumni 20th-century Czech women painters 21st-century Czech women painters