Daniel Balabán

Since the middle of the 1980s Daniel Balabán has been one of the leading artists of the Ostrava art scene and a very important figure in the Czech art world as a whole. He was born on 20 September 1957 in Šumperk, Moravia, but since 1962 has lived in Ostrava. Between 1979 and 1984 he studied at the Professor František Kroudek painting studio at the Academy of Fine Art in Prague, where he became senior lecturer in 2004. From 1993 to 2007 he was head of the painting studio at the Faculty of Fine Art at Ostrava University, and since 2008 has had his own studio at the Institute for Artistic Studies of the same institution.

In his early pictures from the eighties themes relating to the horrors of real socialism and socialist realism (Sower, 1986; Poruba, 1988) are intertwined with sacred themes, which he fully develops later into a brilliant form and which persist in his work basically to the present day. The painting Sower (1986) is a perfect combination of both. The biblical parable of the corn sower as related in St Matthew’s Gospel, combined with the huge shadows of high-rise apartment blocks within a gloomy atmosphere, is an expression of the artist’s internal mood and weariness from the 80s. Balabán became more widely known at the beginning of the 1990s through his canvases featuring classical Christian iconography (Jesus, 1992; St Catherine, 1993). At this time he often reinterpreted the medieval panel portraits by Theodoric of Prague, as can be seen in the work St Catherine (1993). Like Theodoric, using an airy and full colour blotting technique he portrays St Catherine with her typical attribute, a sword, and replaces the decorative pastiglia of the original gothic panel with white prints of the soles of his shoes. Both in his canvases and objects through the whole of the 90s Balabán works almost exclusively with strongly ironised sacred themes, often of Jesus Christ himself (Hymnbook, 1991; Hedgehog in a Cage, 1991; Rattle, 1992).

In his recent paintings religion has been squeezed out or concealed and shifted more in the direction of a kind of spirituality. The human figure meditating on the meaning of life features predominantly, often stylised into the figures of classical works of the giants of global art history, for instance Myron of Eleutherae, Michelangelo, Rodin, and Picasso. For instance, in The Tightrope Walker (2007) the figure on the tightrope is Myron’s Discobolos. However, this figure has lost the ground under its feet for its intended throw, its world as lived. Balabán’s reinterpretations of classical works include David II. (2007) and Portrait (2007), in which we find the famous composition of Michelangelo’s David. Deep spirituality is expressed in the pictures of Buddhist meditation (Buddha, Buddha I, Buddha II, all 2008), in which Balabán avails himself of kitchen crockery to interpret the basic teachings of this school of thought and its invitation to asceticism using the symbol of an empty cake tin, and physical purity using an empty washing up bowl..

As well as classical painting Daniel Balabán also creates digital images (The Old Town Square, 2006) and photography.

Obrazy z let 1987-1989 (kat. výst.), Kulturní středisko Blatiny 1989.

Obrazy z let 1988-1990 (kat. výst.), Galerie Pod Podloubím 1990.

Obrazy (kat. výst.), Ústřední kulturní dům železničářů 1990.

Obrazy z 1987-1991 (kat. výst.), Těšínské divadlo 1991.

Daniel Balabán (kat. výst.), Galerie Caesar 1992.

Daniel Balabán (kat. výst.), Galerie Václava Špály 1993.

Obrazy, objekty (kat. výst.), Galerie výtvarného umění v Ostravě 1993.

Jana Ševčíková, Jiří Ševčík, Heretické obrazy Daniela Balabána, Ateliér VI, č. 5, 4.3.1993, s. 5.

Obrazy (kat. výst.), Moravská galerie v Brně 1995.

Tenebrace-solarizace, Obrazy 1994-1997 (kat. výst.), Výstavní síň Sokolská 26 1997.

Všední nesmrtelnost, Obrazy a fotopráce (kat. výst.), Galerie Felixe Jeneweina města Kutné Hory 1997.

Daniel Balabán (kat. výst.), Výstavní síň Synagoga 1998.

Milan Weber, Nové obrazy Daniela Balabána, Ateliér XI, č. 12, 11.6.1998, s. 6.

Kvanta a prázdna, Obrazy z let 1996-2000 (kat. výst.), Galerie výtvarného umění v Ostravě 2000.

Věra Jirousová, Svatý Šebestián a ty další, Ateliér XIV, č. 20, 11.10.2001, s. 5.

Mind the Gap, Obrazy 2002-2006 (kat. výst.), Dům umění města Brna 2006.

Tak co? (kat. výst.), Galerie Beseda 2008.

Slovník českých a slovenských výtvarných umělců 1950-1997, I. A-Č, Výtvarné centrum Chagall, Ostrava

Milan Weber, Ostravská úderka, Ateliér XVI, 3.4.2003, č. 7, s. 1.

Jan Balabán, Na konci moderny?, Ateliér XVIII, 31.3.2005, č. 7, s. 6.

Lenka Lindaurová, Daniel Balabán, Rozhovor, Art & Antiques V, 2006, č. 11, s. 52-65.

František Kowolowski, Daniel Balabán - nové obrazy, Art & Antiques V, 2006, č. 11, s. 93.