Lot 9: ANTONÍN PROCHÁZKA

ANTONÍN PROCHÁZKA CZECH 1882 - 1945 STILL LIFE (ZÁTIŠÍ) signed with initials AP lower right oil on canvas 40 by 30cm., 15¾ by 11¾in.

Marcela Macharáčková, Antonín Procházka 1882-1945, Brno, 2002, p. 248, no. O 121, catalogued & illustrated (with incorrect dimensions)
Jiří Hlušička, The Hascoe Collection of Czech Modern Art, Prague, 2004, p. 195, no. P60, catalogued; p. 80, pl. 62, illustrated

Joseph Tortorici, Prague
Purchased from the above on 7 March 2000

Painted in 1914, with its striking diagonals and thick impasto, the present work exemplifies Procházka's central role in Czech Cubism. Following a visit to Paris in autumn 1909, Procházka, along with Emil Filla and Josef Čapek in painting and Otto Gutfreund in sculpture, realised the epochal significance of Cubism.

The virtuoso Expressionist strokes provide a firm structure, the cup serving to anchor the composition. As Vojtěch Lahoda has put it: 'This was a style of painting that, despite its being linked to things, objects and figures, seeks more and more sensory richness within itself so that it can, or attempts to, suggest more than visual sensations. To this purpose Procházka's painting becomes more refined, creating contrasts of thick pastes and a rough deep-ploughed surface, smooth areas and tremulous points' (Vojtěch Lahoda, in Antonín Procházka, Prague, exh. cat., 2002, pp. 72-74).

Fig. 1: Antonín Procházka circa 1918.