Jiří Kroha: a 20th-Century Metamorphosis

The publication, which provides the first comprehensive overview of Jiří Kroha's lifelong work, is a team effort by art historians from various countries in Europe and the USA. Employees of the Museum of the City of Brno, whose collections contain the majority of Kroh's estate (Marcela Macharáčková, Lenka Kudělková and Jindřich Chatrný), proceeded to develop a research project for the publication and exhibition of Jiří Kroha's work, which received support from the European Union from the CULTURE 2000 program. Monika Platzer (Architekturzentrum Wien) and Klaus Spectenhauser (Eidgenössische technische Hochschule, Zürich) have been dealing with circles for a long time. New insights are also brought by Rostislav Švácha's (Academy of Sciences of the Institute of Art History of the Czech Republic) article on Mladá Boleslav architectural buildings, articles on Kroh's post-war activities in the service of the communist regime by Martin Strakoš from the National Monument Institute in Ostrava and on the Studio of National Artist Jiří Kroha by Kimberly Elman Zarecor (Iowa State University). The publication also contains the first evaluation of Jiří Kroha's theoretical work written by Dita Dvořáková (National Technical Museum in Prague). The results of the research team bring new insights and points of view not only to the work of Jiří Kroha, but also contribute to the history of architecture and visual arts of the first half of the 20th century in Czechoslovakia.