Ivan Pinkava

The photographer Ivan Pinkava became famous as the author of black and white photographs of stylised human bodies, whose atmosphere, in addition to precise lighting, is modelled by secret iconographic references. Paraphrases of Renaissance masters, models reminiscent of ancient statues or Christian martyrs, and quotations of literary legends permeate Pinkava’s entire oeuvre. But it was primarily in the 1990s and 1990s that a number of photographs were created in which the depictions of men and women evoke the familiar images of saints through their gestures, posture or expression. Despite the frequent nudity, which sometimes leads Pinkava’s work to be simplistically included alongside photographers of a certain genre, the images cannot be described directly as nudes.

The main intention behind his photographs seems to be to evoke a certain contiguity, an emotion arising from a social awareness based on European cultural tradition, religion and history. Specific gestures are thus carriers of meaning and appropriation, but at the same time are transformed into a new icon through the mediator in the photograph. This is the case, for example, in Ecco, La Luce!, or “Behold the Light”, in which one can read a paraphrase of several sources simultaneously. The raised arm with the outstretched index finger of the right hand pointing towards the heavens clearly makes reference to Da Vinci’s Saint John the Baptist. But the fact that the gesture in Pinkava’s photograph is enacted by a bald woman shifts the meaning of the whole scene. The sacred element and the model’s stiff pose are reminiscent of the stillness of ancient statues. At the same time, the scene remains completely compact, minimalist, while being haunting in its conception.

Pinkava works with a similar principle in a number of other photographs. In Tristan (2001), we can discern a reference to Velázquez’s Venus (The Toilet of Venus, also known as The Rokeby Venus) in the pose of the reclining nude. In this case, however, even the title, which in turn belongs to a chivalric legend, seems to imply that the model is male.

Pinkava is repeatedly captivated by the androgynous bodies and faces of the models, whose ambiguity is further enhanced by lighting that recalls the dramatic contrast of Baroque paintings. The role of modern martyrs and romantic heroes is materialised in the exposed scars and open wounds of naked bodies, which are deliberately highlighted in some of the images. The existential, religious atmosphere is also reflected in the stylised minimalist still lifes that often define the subject with their title (Vanitas, 1995, Vanitas, 2008 or Vanity, 2017).

Since around 2009, Pinkava has also been working with stylised colour photography, in which the subject matter comprises mainly stoic still lifes. The colour scheme is always carefully chosen, with the artist shaping the atmosphere of the composition through muted tones. However, even here the human body occasionally appears, and can become another object that shapes the message of the scene (Collapse of Algorithm, 2020). The transition from religious to secular homage is another feature (In Josef Sudek’s Chair, 2019), which is usually recognisable in the composition of the central scene of the photograph. However, the element of almost sacred reverence or silent admiration remains in the message.

Hidden references to cultural history and existential undertones recall Pinkava’s formative years during the period of communism and social repression. After graduating from the Secondary Industrial School of Graphic Arts in Prague, Pinkava studied Art Photography at the Film and Television Faculty of the Academy of Performing Arts between 1982 and 1986. That is, before the Velvet Revolution, when hidden signs helped communication not only in the field of culture. As an important figure on the art scene, Pinkava subsequently helped co-found the Prague House of Photography in 1989, the year of the Velvet Revolution.

He was also head of the Photography Studio at the School of Applied Arts in Prague for three years (between 2005 and 2007). Two years later, in 2009, Pinkava published his third monographic book (with a text by Petr Vaňous). The first, with a text by Josef Kroutvor, had appeared in 1994, and the second in 2004 (with a text by Martin C. Putna).

Pinkava has also achieved considerable international recognition. This is clear not only in his representation in the collections of prestigious institutions and private collectors, but also in his latest monograph. It was published in 2012 on the occasion of a retrospective exhibition at the American University Museum at the Katzen Arts Center in Washington DC. The publication is entitled Remains and is primarily intended for an American audience.

Even over the course of a career spanning several decades, Pinkava has retained his distinctive style while still pushing at its boundaries. Thanks to this, he is rightfully regarded as one of the most important Czech photographers and artists of his generation. The development of his work to date shows a continuing potential that is still far from being fulfilled.

In his black-and-white photographic creations he hovers genre-wise on the border between nudes and portraits. He often chooses persons with relatively atypical, „unsatisfactory“ (often androgynous) bodies, oftentimes even mutually related, to act as models for his workshop photos. The artist achieves a certain generalisation of the concrete (the human body and face become a mirror of meaning, whose content serve as our cultural memory and experience) with the help of specific light modulation – which many times purposefully negates the basic premises of portrait lighting; well-thought-out workshop scenes and emphasis on symbolic attributes (possibly on the costumes and background); and carefully arranged gestures and expressions.

Content-wise the photos draw upon archetypal human stories, mainly those from antique mythology and the Old and New Testaments (of the bible). From a formal viewpoint they reference the portrait traditions of the Renaissance, Mannerism, Baroque and Decadence. The used iconographic schemes are creatively shifted however via refined changes in image relationships.

From a genre point-of-view Pinkava’s approach to the human face and body appears to be very interesting. In his pictures they mutually communicate and actually infirm or refute the original meaning of the categories „portrait“ and „nude.“ Because the artist’s objective is not to „portrait“ a concrete person (with the exception of his series of portraits of famous persons from the Czech alternative culture scene), he chooses rather to induce and capture in the model’s expression something that in the general consciousness characterises a mythological or mythologized figure. One cannot talk here about a portrait in the true sense of the word. Because the human body does not, in Pinkava’s photos, function primarily as a harmonious ensemble of aesthetic forms, but (together with their faces) they work as a expression-creating and definition-creating projection screen. In this case we can hardly reduce these images to mere nudes. Part of his work also includes several still-lifes, where the actual depiction of the objects, which oftentimes in the portrait photographs function as attributes of the human body „telling large tales“ that interestingly fade away (fade into the background).