Jan Krtička – Towards Seydisfjördur

14. 9. 2023 — 25. 11. 2023

Gallery 3
Artist: Jan Krtička
Curator: Adéla Machová

Space and sound – two elements that Jan Krtička (1979,) has been focusing on in his artistic work for several years. He reflects the environments created by them in various thematic projects, from sharing personal experience, through environmental issues to social aspects. He teaches at the Faculty of Art and Design of Jan Evangelista Purkyně University in Ústí nad Labem, where together with Robert Vlasák he leads the Natural Materials Studio. 

In his current artistic practice, he studies places and landscapes, their particularities and specificities. He thematically views the relationship between man and landscape from various angles. Jan Krtička creates new stories and descriptions of the inner and outer world by means of transcriptions, sound recordings, as well as spatial arrangement in the gallery exhibition. An important moment in the creation of artistic situations is personal or spectatorial experience for him.

In a newly prepared project for Gallery 3, Jan Krtička explores and processes the soundtracks of the Icelandic town of Seydisfjördur and its surroundings. What does nature itself sound like where we live? And how is the landscape shaped by man’s active intervention in various ways? These are not the only questions that activate focused listening and trigger our own imagination of the sonically described distant landscape – a magnificent nature to which we gradually add the image of a small port town. Jan Krtička walked along the river towards the town, recording sounds along the way. He was interested in how the sound of the natural landscape gradually begins to blend with the sound environment of the city. Gradually, industrial traces began to add to the murmur of the water and the waterfalls – construction machinery, passing cars in the city center, around the cinema came to a fish processing factory, all of which hummed down to the sea beyond the city. From the field recordings, he has created a sound essay representing a diverse range of local sounds, with the most prominent and ubiquitous element being the sound of water.

→ invitation

→ leaflet for presentation (pdf)