A visit to the paintings and graphics of Jaroslav Šolc, a painter, naivist and autodidact from Prague, is always a literal caress to the soul. Every opening is crowded and visitors do not spare words of praise. Smiles are on the faces of even the naysayers, because despite all the worries that can plague us from time to time, the positive energy and good mood that literally oozes from the exhibited works is transferred to the viewer like a magnet.
J.S. (born in 1953) is one of the names from this unique branch of the artistic arts, such as Karel Chaba, Iva Huttnerová, Ema Srncová or Alexandra Dětinská. He is an artist with a sense of humour, exaggeration and precision in details, which his work is full of. All this is crowned by the often humorous titles of the works. After graduating from an industrial school, he graduated from the Faculty of Arts of Charles University. However, he was enchanted by painting in his youth and has been fully engaged in free painting since 1973. His works are in private and public collections at home and abroad. To this day, his author's account still includes, bottom line, seven hundred canvases with stories, hundreds of graphic sheets and countless art brut paintings. Many of his artworks are also offered on the internet. A funny story is when he applied to study at the Academy of Fine Arts and after the admission interview and viewing the submitted works, the examining professor told him that he did not recommend studying, because he already knew everything and nothing new would be given to him by this university of painting art...
It's better to see once than to hear ten times
That is why we went to the studio in Michalská Street, where Jaroslav Šolc lives and works near the former popular Art Deco Gallery, of which only an eye-catching advertising sign on an old apartment building remains. As it is usually the case with painters, we have to climb dozens of stairs up several floors to get to the studio. To the light and good mood that prevails here. Here we will have a tour of the painter's work and a coffee with the artist, who expresses himself in oil on canvas and sololite, as well as in graphic sheets. When asked the obligatory journalist's question about inspiration, we learn that his muses are music and friendship. The tones and the sunlight create an uplifting mood in the studio, in which new and new works are born... Friendship, that purely beautiful human relationship precisely defined by the words of a popular song, saying that "without love I'm just sad, but without friends I wouldn't survive" is living water for him, so to speak.
Amazing spectacle
A number of his canvases and prints depict, among other things, the city scenery and corners of the artist's hometown, often animated by figures and characters. We can run with the painter to the Lesser Town, for example. But that doesn't stop him from joking around and painting, for example, a work of moving medical figures called Long live Karel Gott.
The titles of his works speak for themselves, as for example in the painting Lost in the Labyrinth of Modern Art, Gates of Earth and Heaven or maybe Retirement, idleness, the kingdom of heaven before us (see photo).
We leaf through a folder of graphic sheets together, waiting for their admirers. Each piece is a geyser of perfectly crafted artistic subject matter with a second plan, so to speak, forcing the viewer to enter the picture and indulge in his own reflections on the vicissitudes of life. And already here we find fantasy elements of abstract creation, which is the second part of the artist's artistic skill. He calls the canvases Signs of the Signs and each of the paintings has a philosophical charge, so it is not a mere play of colours and shapes, as is often the case with abstraction. Let us mention at least the canvases I like winter poop, Malino-strawberry mimicry or Red, Blue and White (Homage to Emil Filo).
To the world and home again
In his time, the painter gathered experience during his exploratory journeys abroad. In Asia, he embraced Oriental philosophy, practiced yoga and vegetarianism, and above all found his way to himself, his life balance and attitudes, and even robust health and good physical condition even after his seventies, all of which is reflected in his painting and art. This came out of an immense desire to express himself through painting and from discovering the works of his predecessors and contemporaries in art publications. He unashamedly admits, for example, his inspiration for painting over picture frames, which was already done by the master Theodoric in his time, and the result is usually very effective.
He is in no hurry to paint, many of his paintings take literally months, often years, to complete. He does not consider them finished until he has come up with a suitable title. Like many other artists, he has his indulgences. For example, he signs his work only with the initials J.S. Or, unlike his neighbour, the painter Kodet, who has a studio right on Old Town Square, he paints in white clothes, perhaps to emphasize the purity of his thoughts and intentions (in fact, to see if the clothes should go into the washing machine.) It is the aforementioned Kristián who works at the painting easel in a tuxedo, to emphasize the fact that working on a painting is always a great holiday for him, and he must be dressed appropriately.
What Wikipedia told us
The saying that modesty ennobles a man is a perfect fit for this painter. He doesn't like to talk about himself, let alone brag about himself. And so it was only from the internet that we learned that in the early 1970s he attended Antonín Balík's lecture series at the National Gallery in Prague, which led him to freelance work, even though his formal education is as a psychologist and teacher. Since the early 1990s, he has been creating graphic sheets using xerography and facsimile techniques, and together with NG and TRICO he has been involved in the development of the now unavailable OFFLITH technique, characterised by the fine structure of printing and the colour fidelity of reproduction. He has held numerous solo exhibitions and participated in many joint exhibitions.
He sought instruction and inspiration during visits to art sanctuaries in London, Paris and Amsterdam. Gallery contacts also took this Czech artist to Switzerland and the USA. He signs his works with his initials in order to distinguish himself from the painter of the same name, Jaroslav Šolc from Police, with whom he is linked by friendship and work.
gnews.cz - Ivan Černý
Reprofoto Miroslav Feszanicz and from the exhibition Balm for the Souls of Fools in the Františkovy Museum from the web Live Cheb
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