Olbram Zoubek ( 1926 - 2017) is a Prague sculptor who made a significant contribution to the history of Czech architectural sculpture in the 20th century. In 2015, his lifelong work was awarded the prestigious title of Knight of Czech Culture by the Ministry of Culture of the Czech Republic. His work is of enduring interest among collectors, as evidenced by the extraordinary current investment offer of his chamber works at Jaskmanický. This is after thirteen years since Zoubek's unique exhibition in the Prague Castle Riding Hall (2013), to which we return in the following retrospective of artists who were there, so to speak...
There was great interest in the long-awaited, balance exhibition of the doyen of Czech sculpture and long queues of domestic and foreign visitors formed in front of the prestigious gallery on the Powder Bridge. Let us not be surprised, it was a top cultural experience and the exhibition of the year.
Zoubek's reason for longevity
It was not long before the doors in Mister's Prague studio were not bursting open, so to speak. The Prague Castle Administration staff, people from the Ministry of Culture, gallery owners and journalists were all on hand. We also joined their crowd. In the company of his right-hand man, secretary, assistant and wife in one person, Mrs. Marie, he offered us a chair and a glass of life-enhancer called slivovitz.
„Is that the reason for your longevity?“ looking for the key to the conversation. „One of many...“ a shrewd look flashes between the slits of his eyelids. „And women...and work...“ he adds as if in passing. We have before us an aging Hemingway-type man with an angular face and a hard chin. Broad shoulders and muscular arms with powerful forearms suggest he is a man of work. How could it not be, after all, restoring buildings and sculpture is hard work, doubly so when done honestly. And Olbram Zoubek doesn't know any other way.
Žižkov in body and soul
Debating with a person who has been in the media spotlight for years is not easy, especially if you are seeing each other for the first time. Everything has been said, everything has been written. Just open the Internet. But even so, few people know that the young Zoubek (born 21 April 1926), who had already volunteered in a student association at real school, originally wanted to be an actor. He could also have been a good bricklayer or carpenter, as he always liked to work with his hands. However, fate decided for him and set him on the path of a successful visual artist.
He attended the municipal school in his native Žižkov in 1932-1937 in Palacký Street, and the real school in Sladkovské náměstí in 1937-1945.
As a good joke, one hears the story that he got a C in drawing in his first year of high school - by grace, he smiles at the memory. In the second year, a new drawing teacher came, Professor Miroslav Kužel, himself a sculptor from UMPRUM, who recognised Zoubek's talent. Under his tutelage, Zoubek soon went from a three to a one. The professor sensed his firm hand from his pupil's robust strokes and after a year of persuasion, Olbram Zoubek enrolled in the modelling classes that Kužel introduced at the school. „And sculpture caught my eye,“ he says of himself. „Professor Kužel suggested to my parents that he would prepare me for the Academy exams, which decided my fate.“
Admirer of feminine beauty
Today, the teacher would surely be proud of his diligent pupil. He has a thousand works to his credit, mostly of female characters. From small intimate sculptures, relief to monumental. They decorate private and state collections at home, in Europe and the USA, adorn various banks, foyers and illuminate many squares or other public spaces. Portraits, busts or heads of personalities from the world of politics, culture or sport are practically not made by Olbram Zoubek.
Except for the legendary posthumous cast of Palach's face. During his political engagement during the dismantling of the Iron Curtain and the dismantling of socialism, he briefly earned the nickname „castle sculptor“ thanks to his friendship with Václav Havel, in whose circle he moved and the commissions that resulted. Because he was, in his own words, „relatively clerical and organizationally gifted after his father“, he was active, among other things, in building a new post-Soviet art union - the Union of Art Changes.
Many meetings and working sessions were held in his studio, including those reviving the oldest Czech association, the Umělecký Slova, of which he was mayor for two terms and is still a great patron of the association. It should be added that the master has his heart on his sleeve and helps the needy, among other things, he donates some of his works every year to charity events such as the traditional Konta Bariéry art auction.
Honor to whom honor is due¨
In 1990, Olbram Zoubek received the National Award of the Czech Republic and in 1996 he was honoured with the Medal of Merit of the First Degree. The European Trebbia Award is also prestigious. We cannot forget the Artis Bohemia Amicis award for spreading the good name of Czech culture not only at home but also abroad. „Worldly glory, grass of the field...“ modestly waves the hand of the master who immodestly wished for his eighty-fifth birthday a philosopher's stone, the elixir of life and a peaceful death. „It is only art that endures and survives, like the Greek art, which has been a great model and inspiration to me all my life.
I am equally inspired by Greek mythology and female beauty.“ In the early 1950s, Zoubek worked in his studio at Židovské pecy (where he lived with his first wife, the sculptor Eva Kmentová), and the main part of his work was done in his workshop in the courtyard of Salmovská Street, where he has been working for half a century. The place is legendary, at one time it was the home of the Italian stonemason Ciani, who supplied marble for the construction of the National Theatre. „I have this sarcophagus left from him,“ Olbram Zoubek points behind him. „Not a cast, but the original, a hundred years after Christ. One of four pieces that are in the republic.“
Years on the restoration scaffolding
The path to art was not easy even for such a great talent as Zoubek. At one time he applied to the Academy of Fine Arts in Prague, but was not accepted. However, he was not discouraged and completed a stone sculpture apprenticeship with sculptor Otakar Velinský. From 1945 to 1952 he studied at the Academy of Arts and Crafts under Professor Josef Wagner.
Under his guidance, he immersed himself in the secrets of restoration work and specialised in Renaissance sgraffito and stone sculpture. This came in very handy at a time when he had problems with commissions and exhibitions due to his civic attitudes and made a living as a restorer. He likes to recall a large chunk of his life, 20 whole seasons, which he spent on the restoration scaffolding while working on the Renaissance castle in Litomyšl, where, among other things, he saved the statics of the historic house U rytíře on the square. The charming East Bohemian town became his destiny.
It was also his second home, where he has a permanent exhibition, a house and studio and honorary citizenship, to which Olbram Zoubek once told us with his own openness: „I have one foot in Litomyšl and the other in Prague. I am travelling between these cities and I don't know where to die, on what bed. But I have already made up my mind that when I die I will be cremated. And I want my ashes to be divided into two piles. Let one be scattered in Prague and the other in Litomyšl...“ With these words, master Zoubek said goodbye to us in 2013, during the described visit to his studio. By the way, his wish was fulfilled to the last letter.
Extraordinary investment offer
The work of Olbram Zoubek is represented in galleries, public spaces and important private collections at home and abroad. It has long enjoyed a stable demand on the art market not only in the Czech Republic. The combination of artistic quality, the prestige of the name and price growth makes it an attractive option for collectors with significant investment potential.
Photo of the presented investment set priced at CZK 2 500 00 for six unique bronze sculptures by Olbram Zoubek from 2008 - Atropos, Klóthó, Lachesis and Mira 1, Mira 2 and Mira 3. The work is accompanied by the relevant certificates.
More at: investment offer-Jaskmanicky, s.r.o
Ivan Cerny
