Artist

Pravoslav Sovak

Ariadne, 1988-93

Big Plate, 1980-93

Ithaka, 1988-93

Pravoslav Sovak

1926
Pravoslav Sovak is born in Vyoské, Mýto, East Bohemia.

1930
His family moves to Plzeň, an industrial city in West Bohemia.

1939
During World War II Sovak is excluded from studying at all secondary schools of the protectorate of Bohemia. He temporarily works as a laborer at a kaolin plant.

1942
Attends private school for art and design in Prague. Receives a grant to study at the School of Ceramics in Bechyně.

1943
Meets art historian Vincenç Kramář.

1945-47
Sovak completes his final secondary-school examinations in the summer in Prague and attends the Academy of Fine Arts there. In the Faculty of Philosophy of Charles University Prague, Sovak attends lectures on art history and aesthetics. He produces his first drypoint etchings and drawings.

1946
Travels to Paris and hitchhikes across France.

1948-56
In times of political changes in the country, varying occupations, such as mine work, building dams and steel works. Produces very few drawings.

1956
Marries Hana Slavíková.

1957
Moves to the district of Smichov, Prague. Begins experimenting with etching.

1958
Travels to Venice, Paris and throughout Egypt.

1959
Exhibition at Václav Špála Gallery, Prague; also at the gallery at Biberstrasse, Vienna and in the Kunstverein Klagenfurt. Sovak, however, is not allowed to leave Czechoslovakia.

1960
Travels to Moscow and Leningrad. Designs costumes for film.

1963
A solo exhibition of his work is held at the Kunstverein Kassel. Travels to Kassel, Munich, Cologne, Hamburg and Copenhagen.

1964-66
Is awarded the Folkwang-Press prize in Essen. Meets Mark Tobey. Purchases an old mill which he converts into a studio over the course of several years.

1967
Works with the Danish lithographer Sorensen. Receives first prize in the Triennial of colored graphics in Grenchen, Switzerland.

1968
Leaves Bohemia during the Prague Spring. Meets Gert Schegulla.

1969
Moves to Switzerland. An exhibition of his work is held at the Museum of Decorative Arts, Zurich where he works as a lecturer for two years.

1970
His first exhibition in the United States is held at the Print Club, Philadelphia. Begins spending time in New York, California and Arizona. Begins Indirect Messages, a sixteen-piece folio.

1971
A retrospective of his work is held at Overbeck-Gesellschaft, Luebeck. His work is included in “Art and Politics,” an exhibition organized by the Kunsthalle Basel.

1972
Indirect Messages is purchased by the Museum of Modern Art, New York. He participates in the Venice Biennale. The Kunstverien Mannheim organizes a retrospective exhibition of his work.

1973
Travels in the deserts of Arizona, Utah and New Mexico.

1975
Becomes a professor of Graphic Arts at the University of Applied Art and Design, Cologne.

1976-77
A solo exhibition is held at Achim Moeller, Ltd., London. Begins his Museum Pictures series.

1978
Relocation to Hergiswil in the Swiss canton Nidwalden. Exhibition of the Associated American Artists at the Print Club, Philadelphia.

1980
Participation in the exhibition “Printed Art – A View of two Decades” at Museum of Modern Art, New York.

1984
Complete retrospective at Kunstverein Mannheim. Exhibition in tandem with the International Music Festival, Lucerne. Exhibition at Atelier Lambert Gallery, Paris.

1988-89
Solo exhibition at Achim Moeller Fine Art, New York.

1991-2000
Lives and works in Paris.

1991
Inaugural exhibition at Art Museum Stans with a retrospective of Sovak’s graphic work.

1994
Retrospective "Zeitstreit“ held at Kupferstichkabinett, Berlin with a Catalogue Raisonné of the graphic works (1958–1994).

1995
Retrospective held at the National Gallery, Prague.

1996
"Sovak. Gravures et dessins," Pavillion des Arts, les Musées de la Ville de Paris.

1999
Retrospective exhibition is held at the Albertina, Vienna.

2002
"Sovak. Walls and other Works," Nildwaldner Museum, Stans.

2007-09
Retrospective at Leopold Hoesch-Museum Düren, at the Kunstforum Ostdeutsche Galerie, Regensburg, and at the State Russian Museum, St. Petersburg.

2014
Solo exhibition “Themes & Variations„ at Moeller Fine Art, Berlin. Included in “From Warhol to Richter – In between Photography and Printmaking,” Museum Folkwang, Essen.

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