Basic info
| technika | olej, plátno |
| rozměr | 61 x 100 cm |
| datace | 1965 |
| signatura | sign. vpravo dole: Beneš 65. |
About
n object does not have to be poetic to be perceived as poetic; in Beneš's paintings, it is color that poeticizes objects and landscapes. Influenced by Renaissance painting, Cubism, modern neo-primitivism, and folk art, he developed his own recognizable concept of space, the volume of objects, and their place in that space. His frequent subjects—village buildings, industrial landscapes, mines, and city outskirts—did not seek recognition among the slogans of the time. They stood as if outside their time. Through his works, the author brought to life the universal elemental nature of the world and remained firmly rooted in the present in the full sense of the word. For Beneš, the 1960s were a time when he was able to present his work to public criticism for the first time in a major exhibition (1962 in Hradec Králové), when he acquired a new studio space in Prague-Vršovice, which became the subject of several of his paintings, and when he undertook his trip abroad to Italy. Beneš preferred to paint in the fall and did so most often, saying himself that he was an autumn painter. The melancholic view of the landscape with a farmstead is typical of the artist's work in terms of both painting and subject matter, which he fully developed in the 1970s. The large-format painting Brown Landscape with a Farmstead from 1965 ranks among the earlier works in the context of this motif and shares common features with, for example, the landscapes of Ota Janeček, with whom Beneš associated, even though he was considered a rather unsociable loner. The title and date of the painting are located on the verso.
Author
Vlastimil Beneš se narodil 3. října 1919 v Praze.
Studoval na klasickém gymnáziu v Praze-Žižkově v letech 1935–1939 a roku 1939 nastoupil na obor obecné historie na Filozofické fakultě Univerzity Karlovy. Po uzavření českých vysokých škol nacisty pracoval jako dělník v loděnicích v Praze a soustředil se na uměleckou tvorbu. V letech 1940–1943 navštěvoval soukromou školu kreslení Emanuela Frinty. Roku 1943 byl povolán na nucené práce v Německu, po návratu se věnoval malbě a vstoupil do spolku Štursa.
První samostatnou výstavu měl v roce 1956 v Divadle D 34 a o rok později (1957) se stal členem Skupiny Máj 57. Ve svém raném období se zaměřoval na akvarel, později upřednostnil olejomalbu. Hlavními tématy jeho děl byly krajiny české a evropské, obrazy průmyslové krajiny a periférie Prahy. Vedle malby tvořil sochy, často z polychromovaného dřeva, a navrhoval loutky.
Beneš vystavoval v Česku i zahraničí, například v Berlíně, Vídni a Londýně, a jeho díla jsou zastoupena v Národní galerii v Praze i dalších institucích.
Zemřel 17. září 1981 v Praze.