Lot 100

František Drtikol (1883 - 1961) FROM THE COURTYARDS AND BACKYARDS OF OLD PRAGUE

The picturesque corners of old Prague were a great inspiration for Drtikol and photographing them became an important commission for him. These photographs are technically perfect oil prints, showing Drtikol's great professionalism and amazing sense of lighting. This particular photograph is from the album From the Courts and Courtyards of Old Prague, plate 28 - no. 814-V, on which Drtikol worked together with Augustin Škarda (1879 - 1937). They were very positively evaluated by the professional critics of the time. In one of his texts he says about it. Meant in terms of time and place. The same thing speaks quite differently if you look at it from this side or that. For example, when I was doing the Old Prague Courts and Courtyards, I often went to the same place many, many times in order to find the lighting most favourable to that corner. And yet even now, when I sometimes go to the same places by day or by night, I am surprised by the extraordinarily beautiful expression of some motif, quite new to me..." /Doležal S.(ed.): František Drtikol - Oči široce otevřené (Eyes Wide Open), Svět, Prague 2002, p. 55./ The photograph is published in the monograph Fárová A. & Doležal S.: František Drtikol, Stages of Life and Photographic Work / Secession - Art Deco - Abstraction / 1, 2.