Jan Hendrych

“When I was invited to apply and I was chosen by the academy in an open competition, I was tenured as a professor. For another four months I restored the whole facade of a house in Letná. The original designs were by Alfons Mucha. It was worn by rain, the stucco was crumbled. I was on scaffolding, pasting it back on. I was like a bricklayer. The students who knew me would be on their way from school, they’d see me on the scaffolding, working on some curls here and there, it was quite hilarious. I joined the academy in 1990. I was also asked by the students from UMPRUM [the Academy of Arts, Architecture & Design - trans.]. I didn’t care. I had originally graduated from UMPRUM, I got my research degree at the academy. I chose to teach at the academy because I saw that people like Nepraš and some others whom I knew had applied to the competition. I was chosen by the people in the committee. It included Knížák, Zoubek, and some others, I can’t remember any more.”

“Say that sculptor, Háma, he took it awfully seriously. He always got so angry that he turned red like a turkey. The architect whom I worked with was of a different opinion than that of the committee, and so he was chased out and told not to come until two weeks later. Those were bitter struggles at time. [Q: This seems important to me because it shows how the system worked, which not many people know about.] It was the Soviet system, which was aped, copied, and applied here. Except if someone in Russia after the October Revolution believed that the system could work, no one here except four people believed it could. Everyone knew it was bollocks. Because it was a matter of money. It’s important for people to earn a living, so it wasn’t much of a joke. The people who weren’t even listed in the art fund didn’t have the means for food. Say Pepíček Steklý, the restorer, he signed Charter 77, and when there was a big restoration exhibition, which had things he had repaired in it, his name had to be left out of the catalogue. He had to be silenced, denied. That was so medievally senseless.”

“After 1968, 1969, it was unsustainable. What with the artists’ union abolished, we were listed as entrepreneurs so they wouldn’t lock us up for freeloading. It took five, six years before I could exhibit again. I said some uncomfortable things in Mánes, and they told me not to come there any more. I didn’t know what I would do, how I’d earn a living. We already had one child. Because I was a pretty decent modeller, one colleague - a restorer who was certified for the work - took me in, and I worked on the scaffolding with him officially in his name. We worked half and half, but it was officially on him. On Jirka Laštovička. And that lasted me 30 years. Although in time, because some of the restorers who were in the committee knew me, they said I should do it under my own name, that it would be approved by the restoration department. So after five years I could work officially.”

“We frequented the pub by the football pitch in Střešovice. The Placák boys used to go there, I knew both of them and Mrs Placáková too, who was a nurse. I only really knew Mr Placák, the doctor, by sight from various concerts. But our families were acquainted. We held various treasonous conversations, and some good soul snitched on us. In short, about a week later I received a summons to come to Bartholomew Street [the State Security HQ - trans.] to give a formal explanation. I thought it would be interesting, but it wasn’t. One was good, one was bad, like it is in every good crime film. I told them I didn’t remember much of it. That I had had a bit to drink. Then they invited me to Café Slávia, where the gent offered me membership and said they’d like to have me. I told them I was a terrible blabbermouth, that I drank and that I’d divulge all their secrets. They let me be after that, luckily.”

“Artists were always entrepreneurs, it was always like that. If you wanted to earn a good living, you did Red Army scenes. If you weren’t that sort of person, you didn’t. But then there was such a matter, that for instance the Interior Minister Barák collected the works of artists who were not allowed to exhibit. Say, Zrzavý or Tichý. He bought them privately, so no one would know about it. He had collections. He was clever, so he knew those had value. There were such anomalies.”