Autor: Roman Prahl
Kurátor: Petr Jindra

The focus of the exhibition is related to the theme of the 43rd annual Pilsen Interdisciplinary Symposium on the Nineteenth Century, which takes place as part of the Smetana Days festival in Pilsen and is subtitled "Years of Wandering". From the very beginning, the PIS programmes have fostered up-to-date expert approaches to the given topics. The nineteenth century and its cultural legacy is now perceived as extending far beyond calendar boundaries, and the exhibition The Art of the Very Long Century consistently reflects this approach. The thematic series of artworks on human movement in space presented in this exhibition overlaps to the present day and focuses mainly on the phenomenon of human movement on foot.

Works of leading Czech artists (paintings, drawings, prints, photographs, smaller spatial objects and videos) will be on display. The exhibits originate from a number of leading public and private collections and include some previously unexhibited major works and artefacts.
The chronologically and content-rich theme is divided into several parts in the exhibition and the accompanying publication:
The first part covers the motifs of travel, walks, trips and wanderings; it also touches upon the issue of exile, which is especially referred to in graphic art. The second part includes larger and smaller paintings representing the development from Romanticism to the renewal of the radical impulses of Romanticism at the turn of the twentieth century. The third, more intimate section connects the first and third parts of the exhibition space.
The fourth and fifth parts deal with walking through the city, using Prague as an example, in the works of artists interconnected with poetic texts from the beginning of the twentieth century to the present. The final part is dominated by photographic series of streets with an emphasis on pavements and their historical and contemporary cultural applications.
Parts of the exhibition (provisional titles):
1/ Veduta and Human Presence in the Landscape
2/ Between Romanticism and Modernity
3/ ‘Postmodern’ Returns to Wandering
4/ Strolls around the City with Poets
5/ Feeling the City in One’s Soles

Selected artists and authors: F. X. Procházka, František Tkadlík, Josef Navrátil, Antonín Machek, Karel Postl, Václav, Josef and Quido Mánes, August Piepenhagen, Emil Orlik, Franz Kafka, Jiří Kolář, František Hudeček, Emila Medková, Adriena Šimotová, Eugen Brikcius, František Skála, and Viktor Karlík.

West Bohemian Gallery in Pilsen — Exhibition Hall „13“