Pilsen, Czech Republic, is the European City of Culture for 2015. Josef Mištera, who heads the faculty of design at UMĚNÍ LADISLAVA SUTNARA, at the University of West Bohemia, is spearheading a festival in honor of Ladislav Sutnar. “Our faculty turned a big exhibition grounds [into a showcase] for presenting the best works which have students done in its history,” he told me. This includes several unique installations (see photos by clicking here), like a mammoth heart beating with rhythmic colors, hanging in the center of the Sutnar building: “Of course it is the heart of Ladislav Sutnar,” Mištera said. There are also three moving objects/sculptures, including real automobiles that were made by the students for this event and driven as part of an official opening parade that took place in the streets of Pilsen city.
The whole evening was interactive: There was a modern Mona Lisa (a project created by the Faculty of Applied sciences) where the lights in the building reacted to the sound, movement and density of the crowd. In the theater a motion capture was presented to the public when two dancers moved two figures that were designed by one of the Sutnar faculty members. The background for a fashion show was Sutnar’s Venus paintings that echoed the colors worn by the models on the catwalk.
Also underway later in March is the opening of the Ladislav Sutnar Book Design exhibition, and an Hommage to Sutnar, a big exhibition at the Vaclav Havel airport in Prague. “This will be a big poster exhibition of students from different countries of Europe. In the summer time we hope to realize two big exhibitions of Sutnar in the Pilsen city center,” Mistera told me. He added that one of them will probably be based on Sutnar’s toy titled “Build the Town” (above) that will take up the street on which the Sutnar Gallery is located. Here are some of the proposals (below). And here is the Cooper Hewitt video on Sutnar explaining “Build the Town.”
The February 2015 issue of Print—Type Today—is out now.In this issue, Print tackles one of its readers’ most passionate topics: Typography. We take a deep dive into how type has evolved—where it has been in the past, major industry milestones and so on—and analyze current trends to decode where it’s going tomorrow. Print also looks at new artists who are taking it there by naming 9 Type Designers to Watch in 2015. Get a copy today.
