Štefan Tóth
Radiance / Drifting Center
Artist
Štefan Tóth
(1974, Žatec), Czech
Original Title
Radiance / Drifting Center
Date2015
Mediumoil on canvas
Dimensions200 × 300 cm
Classificationspaintings
Credit LineKunsthalle Praha
DescriptionŠtefan Tóth is a Czech conceptual painter whose practice focuses on working with the principles of appropriation and reinterpretation. He looks to appropriate varied authors and pieces from a broad historical spectrum ranging from the Baroque to the present day. This approach is underpinned by his extensive theoretical knowledge of art history and of the technical nuances of exhibition practices. His appropriations do not seek accurate imitation, but rather to paraphrase the original works, often through a shift of medium, scale, or material. Tóth also aims to manipulate the context of the given work, as such a revision and recoding of the original ideas underlying a work confronts viewers with their ability to differentiate and draws attention to the necessity of developing their own sensory perceptions and understandings of the piece. Tóth usually produces his works in series, each of which focuses on a different artist and makes use of a different technique and style.
Radiance/Drifting Center (2015) is part of a series in which Tóth juxtaposed modernist works created around the same time but with vastly different themes and styles. He likens his explorations of modernist forms to meticulous anatomical inquiry, allowing him to create enigmatic mosaics, the content of which is only fully revealed to a knowledgeable viewer. He understands modernism as an alphabet of signs which can be assembled according to various codes, creating new visual compositions which simultaneously reflect that their originality is based purely in their confrontation with and acknowledgment of their sources. The bottom layer of Radiance/Drifting Center is formed by a painted adaptation of the surrealist collage Melancholy from Jindřich Štýrský’s series Portable Cabinet, which juxtaposes a melancholic female figure, representing old Soviet literature, with a figure of a man from an advertisement for suspenders. Štýrský’s collages were radical in their implication that anyone with a pair of scissors and a free-flowing imagination can become an artist. Tóth, however, recreates the original collages through painting, thus substituting Štýrský’s radical suggestion with a traditional, exclusive approach. The surface of the work is covered with a thin layer of spray, evoking the harmonic sophistication of artificialism, a movement which saw the artist as a poet of visual forms. The upper layer of the piece quotes a painting of a constellation of levitating circles and light beams by Leny Meyer-Bergner (1906-1981) from her time studying at the Bauhaus, which strived for an integration of life, art, and technology, and understood art first and foremost as an instrument of social transformation. Despite their significant differences, all the modernist styles juxtaposed in Tóth’s piece seek to redefine the role of the artist and examine the relevance of painting, and these ideas continue to resonate in today’s art world. Through his analytical approach, Tóth suggests that although almost everything has already been done in the name of art and any new creation henceforth cannot avoid repetition, painting still retains its importance by continuously facilitating new sensory experiences.
Štefan Tóth (*1974, Žatec) studied scenography in the Faculty of Theatre at the Academy of Performing Arts in Prague. From 2001 to 2012, he studied at the Academy of Fine Arts in Prague, in the studios of restoration and intermedia work, eventually achieving a doctorate. He also studied abroad at the École nationale supérieure des beaux-arts in Paris under Christian Boltanski in 2007. He has received several awards such as the Louis Vuitton Moët Hennessy Prize and the Miami Meets Milano Prize at the Biennale Milano, as well as the Creative Fellowship from the Ministry of Culture of the Czech Republic. From 2005 to 2007, he was a member of the anonymous art group Kontextual, and in 2008 cofounded Neue Kontextual which exclusively focuses on conceptual art and has a pioneering role in defining its context. Tóth’s work is held in public and private collections worldwide including the National Gallery in Prague, the Barceló Foundation in Spain, and in Australia. One of his pieces is also part of the prestigious Yvon Lambert Collection in Avignon, where his work was also featured in the I Believe in Miracles exhibition in 2011.
Radiance/Drifting Center (2015) is part of a series in which Tóth juxtaposed modernist works created around the same time but with vastly different themes and styles. He likens his explorations of modernist forms to meticulous anatomical inquiry, allowing him to create enigmatic mosaics, the content of which is only fully revealed to a knowledgeable viewer. He understands modernism as an alphabet of signs which can be assembled according to various codes, creating new visual compositions which simultaneously reflect that their originality is based purely in their confrontation with and acknowledgment of their sources. The bottom layer of Radiance/Drifting Center is formed by a painted adaptation of the surrealist collage Melancholy from Jindřich Štýrský’s series Portable Cabinet, which juxtaposes a melancholic female figure, representing old Soviet literature, with a figure of a man from an advertisement for suspenders. Štýrský’s collages were radical in their implication that anyone with a pair of scissors and a free-flowing imagination can become an artist. Tóth, however, recreates the original collages through painting, thus substituting Štýrský’s radical suggestion with a traditional, exclusive approach. The surface of the work is covered with a thin layer of spray, evoking the harmonic sophistication of artificialism, a movement which saw the artist as a poet of visual forms. The upper layer of the piece quotes a painting of a constellation of levitating circles and light beams by Leny Meyer-Bergner (1906-1981) from her time studying at the Bauhaus, which strived for an integration of life, art, and technology, and understood art first and foremost as an instrument of social transformation. Despite their significant differences, all the modernist styles juxtaposed in Tóth’s piece seek to redefine the role of the artist and examine the relevance of painting, and these ideas continue to resonate in today’s art world. Through his analytical approach, Tóth suggests that although almost everything has already been done in the name of art and any new creation henceforth cannot avoid repetition, painting still retains its importance by continuously facilitating new sensory experiences.
Štefan Tóth (*1974, Žatec) studied scenography in the Faculty of Theatre at the Academy of Performing Arts in Prague. From 2001 to 2012, he studied at the Academy of Fine Arts in Prague, in the studios of restoration and intermedia work, eventually achieving a doctorate. He also studied abroad at the École nationale supérieure des beaux-arts in Paris under Christian Boltanski in 2007. He has received several awards such as the Louis Vuitton Moët Hennessy Prize and the Miami Meets Milano Prize at the Biennale Milano, as well as the Creative Fellowship from the Ministry of Culture of the Czech Republic. From 2005 to 2007, he was a member of the anonymous art group Kontextual, and in 2008 cofounded Neue Kontextual which exclusively focuses on conceptual art and has a pioneering role in defining its context. Tóth’s work is held in public and private collections worldwide including the National Gallery in Prague, the Barceló Foundation in Spain, and in Australia. One of his pieces is also part of the prestigious Yvon Lambert Collection in Avignon, where his work was also featured in the I Believe in Miracles exhibition in 2011.
