Josef Šíma
The Tree
Artist
Josef Šíma
(1891, Jaroměř - 1971, Paris), Czech
Original Title
The Tree
Date1929
Mediumink, green chalk and tempera on paper
Dimensions55 × 71 cm
Classificationsdrawings
Credit LineKunsthalle Praha
DescriptionJosef Šíma was a prominent Czech painter based in Paris and an important figure of European modernist painting. Following a brief abstractionist period linked to an enchantment with the world of technology, he began focusing on the poetic and symbolic dimensions of painting. This interest led him to a close collaboration with Le Grand Jeu, a group of young artists and poets. Šíma’s poetic works, based on a continuous dialogue between earth and heaven, combine collective archetypes layers of human consciousness with childhood memories and dreams as well as initiatory visions in landscapes. This artistic expression can be understood as a poeticized, lyrical contemplation of nature. Šíma’s works from the 1930s draw on the tradition of Earth mythologies and explores new forms of representation and mythological motifs reflecting the crisis of European humanism. Following a decade-long hiatus caused by World War II, his work was reshaped by a reevaluation of artistic expression and the themes relating to Le Grand Jeu. In his later work, Šíma focuses on a synthesis of deep contemplation of nature and the universe, expressed by monochromatic colors and light reminiscent of tachism, a popular art style at the time. Simultaneously, however, these works retain Šíma’s signature meditative depth and poetic intuition.
This subtle piece titled Tree (1929) dates from Šíma’s time in Le Grand Jeu, during which he discovered his own inner world and artistic language rooted in introspective contemplation and a poetic portrayal of material reality. This new approach stems from a monistic view of the world and a rejection of empirical spatial relations, which allowed Šíma to abandon realistic representation in favor of symbolist portrayals of the essence landscapes based on constitutive elements—a cloud, a tree, and an abstract matter forming an energy field.
Josef Šíma (1891, Jaroměř ─ 1971, Paris) was born into an artistic family. He studied in Jan Preisler’s studio at the Academy of Arts, Architecture and Design in Prague and later at the Brno University of Technology. Šíma spent four years fighting in World War I in Galicia, Russia, and Italy. After the war, he spent one more year in Brno, moving to Paris in 1921. He became a member of the Paris-based art group Le Grand Jeu which included the poets René Daumal, Roger Gilbert-Lecomte, and Roger Vailland. These young poets coupled the rationalist values traditionally prioritized by Western civilization, with imaginative, intuitive, and instinctive dimensions, providing Šíma with a space to develop his characteristic lyrical imagination rooted in his monistic worldview. After a decade-long hiatus from art caused by several months of deployment during World War II, he returned to creating art in 1950. Despite spending most of his life in France, Šíma kept in touch with the Czech art scene. In 1920, before moving to Paris, he joined the leftist avantgarde art group Devětsil and continued to follow its exhibitions from Paris while also working as a correspondent for the group’s publications Pásmo and Stavba. After joining the influential artists’ forum Umělecká beseda in 1930, his ties to the Czech avantgarde scene began to wane as he gradually became a more individualistic figure within the art scene. He helped organize the international exhibition Poesie, hosted in Prague’s Mánes Gallery in 1932, which aided the rise of surrealist painting in the Czech context. World War II, during which he fought in the resistance movement, led him to a creative crisis. After the war, Šíma dedicated himself to Czech-French cultural exchange until 1950. Following the Communist coup in Czechoslovakia in February 1948, his contacts with the Czech scene were cut; simultaneously, however, his art gained wider recognition in France. In 1955, his work was included In the French collection at the 3rd São Paulo Art Biennial, which was also later displayed at an exhibition titled Art from France at the Museum of Modern Art in San Francisco. In 1959, Šíma exhibited his work at Documenta 2 in Kassel, which reviewed the evolution of post-war art. His first retrospective exhibition, linked to a proper appreciation of his work, took place in Prague and in Paris in 1968. Šíma died in 1971. His works are currently included in the collections of numerous museums including the National Gallery Prague, the Moravian Gallery in Brno, the Gallery of West Bohemia in Pilsen, the Kunstmuseum Bochum, the Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris, and the Musée de Ville de Paris.
This subtle piece titled Tree (1929) dates from Šíma’s time in Le Grand Jeu, during which he discovered his own inner world and artistic language rooted in introspective contemplation and a poetic portrayal of material reality. This new approach stems from a monistic view of the world and a rejection of empirical spatial relations, which allowed Šíma to abandon realistic representation in favor of symbolist portrayals of the essence landscapes based on constitutive elements—a cloud, a tree, and an abstract matter forming an energy field.
Josef Šíma (1891, Jaroměř ─ 1971, Paris) was born into an artistic family. He studied in Jan Preisler’s studio at the Academy of Arts, Architecture and Design in Prague and later at the Brno University of Technology. Šíma spent four years fighting in World War I in Galicia, Russia, and Italy. After the war, he spent one more year in Brno, moving to Paris in 1921. He became a member of the Paris-based art group Le Grand Jeu which included the poets René Daumal, Roger Gilbert-Lecomte, and Roger Vailland. These young poets coupled the rationalist values traditionally prioritized by Western civilization, with imaginative, intuitive, and instinctive dimensions, providing Šíma with a space to develop his characteristic lyrical imagination rooted in his monistic worldview. After a decade-long hiatus from art caused by several months of deployment during World War II, he returned to creating art in 1950. Despite spending most of his life in France, Šíma kept in touch with the Czech art scene. In 1920, before moving to Paris, he joined the leftist avantgarde art group Devětsil and continued to follow its exhibitions from Paris while also working as a correspondent for the group’s publications Pásmo and Stavba. After joining the influential artists’ forum Umělecká beseda in 1930, his ties to the Czech avantgarde scene began to wane as he gradually became a more individualistic figure within the art scene. He helped organize the international exhibition Poesie, hosted in Prague’s Mánes Gallery in 1932, which aided the rise of surrealist painting in the Czech context. World War II, during which he fought in the resistance movement, led him to a creative crisis. After the war, Šíma dedicated himself to Czech-French cultural exchange until 1950. Following the Communist coup in Czechoslovakia in February 1948, his contacts with the Czech scene were cut; simultaneously, however, his art gained wider recognition in France. In 1955, his work was included In the French collection at the 3rd São Paulo Art Biennial, which was also later displayed at an exhibition titled Art from France at the Museum of Modern Art in San Francisco. In 1959, Šíma exhibited his work at Documenta 2 in Kassel, which reviewed the evolution of post-war art. His first retrospective exhibition, linked to a proper appreciation of his work, took place in Prague and in Paris in 1968. Šíma died in 1971. His works are currently included in the collections of numerous museums including the National Gallery Prague, the Moravian Gallery in Brno, the Gallery of West Bohemia in Pilsen, the Kunstmuseum Bochum, the Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris, and the Musée de Ville de Paris.
