Rupert Kytka

The lesser known and undeservedly forgotten art photographer Rupert Kytka (1910–1993) is a member of the generation of artists associated with the interwar amateur movement. However, he created his most important works in the 1960s as a founding member of the group DOFO in Olomouc, the first Czechoslovak photographic association after the war (founded in 1959); Ivo Přeček and Vilém Reichmann, among others, contributed to the fame of the group in the following years. Kytka’s images dealing with the poetry of everyday life (touching on both Surrealism and imaginative art) and his photographs approaching the styles of Op-art and the Informel in their expression (of glass structures) are his most successful works during this time period. However, his best images are those of exterior and interior still-lives, often depicting discarded and destroyed objects with great sensitivity. Rupert Kytka conluded his photographic career with the outstanding collection Dobrá země (Good Earth / 1969-1979), in which, once again, he demonstrated his masterful ability to capture the theme, mainly in the details. In this work he reflected on his life-long interest in photographing mountain landscapes. A representative selection (almost fifty reproductions) from Kytka’s unpretentious yet truly classic work is introduced by the ground-breaking study by Lukáš Bártl.