“Central Europe is a place whose modern history has spawned more cultural watersheds than its inhabitants have been able to cope with by civilised means. The history of the Czech nation and its statehood is no exception. Historians and politicians, idealists and realists, democrats and their enemies all seek to understand these watersheds. Everyone is on a quest for history, even if their minds are set on the present and future.” (from the book In Quest of History by Jiří Přibáň and Karel Hvížďala, published by Karolinum Press, 2019)
 

The exhibition Middle of Europe presents a selection of recent acquisitions of works by members of the young and middle generation of Czech artists who have garnered attention in their home country, show great promise, and are definitely talented individuals. In other words, it is not technique, subject matter,
or age that binds them together, but their talent and their unique, original style. Contextually, the artist Jiří David, who already belongs to a significant generation of 80-90 years, is also assigned to this selection. Lucia Lettenmayer, co-owner of the COLLETT Prague | Munich exhibition, describes her motivation for holding the exhibition as follows: “We felt the need to show that Czech art is comparable with top- quality foreign art; it just is not appropriately presented in the long term as it should be.”

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The COLLETT Prague | Munich collection is a more than fourteen-year-old privately owned, non-public gallery of art housed at a chateau in Jirny not far from the Czech capital, Prague. With works by more than 1,100 artists, primarily from the contemporary Czech and foreign scenes, it is one of the largest collections in the Czech Republic, with holdings comparable to those of many state-run institutions.