Lot 79

Pravoslav Kotík (1889 - 1970) RECUMBENT

Pravoslav Kotík’s Recumbent is a fine example from a period in his career that is highly valued among collectors, the period when the influence of Cubism following his study trips to Paris was reflected in his work. A woman recumbent on a sofa, turning her face provocatively towards the viewer, hints at Picasso’s Demoiselles d'Avignon and African period – art highly sought after by the Paris avant-garde. The statuesque body emphasized by a bold line bears echoes of Neoclassicism, a style also favored by Rudolf Kremlička, a fellow artist from the Mánes Union of Fine Artists who shared Kotík’s interest in Social Art.

Kotík studied at both the School of Applied Arts and the Academy of Fine Arts in Prague in the 1920s and joined the country’s major art associations – Mánes Union of Fine Artists and Umělecká Beseda. It was here where he met artists Karel Holan, Miloslav Holý and Karel Kotrba, who in 1924 co-founded Ho-Ho-Ko-Ko Social Group focused on realistic subjects and social themes. Many layers can be found in Kotík’s oeuvre, from Expressionism and Fauvism in his early work and Cubism and Neoclassicism in the Twenties to touches of Surrealism in the Fifties. His paintings unfurl stories of lovers in cafés, toiling villagers, and people coming to terms their existence in the face of modern civilization.