Jindřich Zeithamml

“Why have you decided to emigrate?“ – “Because of a simple reason: I couldn’t do my job. The perspective was quite clear. We told myself that if we remained, we might work as castle wardens, get out of public attention, get three casks of beans and survive somehow. Romantic ideas like these. But it wasn’t a realistic scenario. Had we stayed in the country, we would have probably drunk ourselves to death. Unfortunately, I didn’t know languages. Naturally, we went into the unknown, but there was a kind of opportunity at least. Here, it was all cast in lead, you couldn’t move here.”

„I met Moucha at Kyncl’s, Kyncl functioned as a very important cultural point in the artist diaspora. He had a great talent for putting people together and organising them, so it was at his flat that I met Moucha. He arrived from Paris with sculptor Škoda and they brought some manifesto. It was a time when everybody was writing something. And they travelled along galleries in North Rhineland - Westphalia.” “What they had in it?” – “Some artistic statement. I don’t remember what was in it and I don’t want to remember. He then returned to Paris and I later used to visit him. I went to visit him in Paris three or four times. And he stayed with me for some time in Düsseldorf. There was a sponsor named Stockheim in Düsseldorf and he had a catering business. He sponsored artists by providing them with a studio, some money, a place to stay. I remember that he helped Kotík. And also Moucha, who stayed with me for about half a year, so we had discussions, drank and went to see exhibitions.”

“In the 1960s, artists had excellent conditions here. They built their studios, Malich among them, they had work all the time. Koblasa, for instance, got a huge job at the airport. You could say that artists had an exceptionally easy life. I worked as a stonemason and didn’t get the commissions. I did minor stuff in Pilsen, things like a memorial plaque. On the Charles Bridge I did stones, the stone balustrade. Balustrade on top – that was more quality work, and the dripstone – that was very top. It was quite fine before I went to Pilsen, to the Fund of Artists.”

“I arrived from Pilsen two days before the invasion. I spent the night in Michle, at the flat of sculptor Minařík, a friend from Hořice. At night there were shots suddenly. We rushed to the Wenceslas Square and spent the day running around Prague. We went to the Castle, where we saw Sudek, standing and observing what was happening. We met a work colleague, a person responsible for stonemasonry budget. He carried a carton of cigarettes and said: ‘Guys, go and get cigarettes. You won’t be able to buy any shortly.’ The shops were empty, they just had sour milk in bottles. You kept thinking about emigrating all the time. I had planned to go to France but before I decided they closed the borders. Later I wanted to go to Yugoslavia, but it was really difficult to get the approval. I wasn’t successful.”

“What was the study in Düsseldorf like?” – “Exceptionally good. No horrors like there are today at similar schools, when you have to write something all the time, some doctorates etc. Absolute nonsense. You had a studio and you could simply work. There are many people who deal in with something that already exists, there are too many of them, they need to do something for their living, so they keep inventing pseudo-jobs etc. This what the times are like now. In Düsseldorf I could be in the studio even during holidays, any time, on Sundays… I had a studio, it was warm inside and I was given a scholarship. We had the excellent professor Krike. Also Graubner, Beuys, all of them great artists. No average or terrible teachers. I could do absolutely what I wanted to do.” – “What is it that the professors gave to you?” – “Mainly I was given the opportunity to do something. You got into the academic environment, the centre of artistic life, you don’t enter it from the outside. In this the school was very beneficial.” – “At that time you mainly drew and painted?” – “Yes, I used to paint. I had a flat and there I could no do sculpture. It was actually before I went to the school. I did some portraits in the theatre. I got to the academy mainly through my painting. I had some photos of stuff I had done. There were no exams like they are here when you have to create something in just a few days. There you had an interview with the professor, you showed him things you had done and that was it.”