academic painter Dimitrij Kadrnožka

“Once I ran into trouble on the street near Jindřišská tower. There was a guy from Wehrmacht there, wearing shoulder boards which probably made him a major or a colonel – it was clear he was a high-ranked officer. He asked me directions in German. I don’t recall anymore where exactly he wanted to go. But anyway, I told him off in a very rude way. I told him he was a German swine and so on. And this gentleman put his hand on my shoulder and told me in very good Czech: ‘Please, don’t say this because if I were a German swine, I would have taken you with me now and you’d be shot dead tomorrow. Remember that and beware of talking to us.’ I’m not saying I liked those Germans but still there was at least someone among them who felt sorry for a little twat like me and spared me. But I must say they were beasts and I witnessed them doing terrible things.”

“In each atelier there were boys from the student Communist party committee. They had their people. In our case it was Lauda who later became director of Mikoláš Aleš gallery. He used to ask me: ‘Miťan, what about you? Are you not joining?’ I told him that I wasn’t. He replied: ‘Why not?’ So I had discussions with them, explaining that we weren’t buying it while they were comparing it to Christianity and such bullshit. But we didn’t budge. So they proposed our expulsion from school. But since back then the teachers had a word in the case we got away with it. Still, nobody really pressured us hard. It was more like – boys, don’t be stupid, come on. But we were simply pig-headed. I can’t imagine that I would’ve listened to Gottwald, do you understand? To me, he was a complete idiot.”