Karel Miler

"We didn't even consider ourselves professional artists. We started by inspiration. One day in 1971 Petr Štembera was on a walk in Suchdol. He picked up a stone there, put it in a net bag, put the bag over the shoulder and brought it all the way to Dejvice. What was that? Suddenly he knew that this was the beginning of something. It was born just as Phoenix out of the ashes. At once, you realize - this is it! But what is it? You just know that this is it! And then you wait for a second inspiration to tell you: 'This must be done! This is it.' We were led to doing the thing but it can't be explained how. It just had to be done. And when you know there is nothing else to do, you can easily go and work as a shopkeeper or whatever and not mind it. When he couldn't paint anymore the painter František Tichý got drunk and told his pals in the pub: 'Damn, I'd love to paint!' But there was nothing for him to paint anymore. He just couldn't let go."

"Never in our dreams could we imagine something like an invasion by armies of our allies. That was a blast! One could not get their head around it. For a long time I didn't take it seriously. Only when Palach set himself on fire did I become alarmed. I regularly got out of the metro up at Muzeum and walked down Wenceslas Square to the library. There was a round garden bed there where people lit candles for Palach. One day in March I got out of the metro, walked towards the bed and at once felt: 'It's over, it's over, it's over!' The nation gave up and all hopes were gone!"