Artist
Václav Cigler
Artist
Václav Cigler belongs among the most prominent of the 1960s generation of artists. Through his creations, he anticipated emergent concepts of contemporary expression (constructive tendency, minimalism, land-art, light and kinetic plastics). The domain of his work is the manipulation with space, glass, light and water. He focused on the theme of water particularly during the Louisiana World Exposition, the First International Water Sculpture Competition, in 1984. He completed a wide range of objects and installations, and his works are represented in numerous Czech and International galleries. In 1965, Cigler founded his own Glass in Architecture studio at the Academy of Fine Arts and Design in Bratislava, which he headed until 1979. Cigler acquired a reputation in the 1960s for geometrical objects made from cut solid optical glass. Light played a crucial role in these, reflected along the edges and in the fissures of the glass. In the next decade his search for new ideas and ways of realising them led him to move beyond work dominated by aesthetic concerns. Rather than disrupting the unity of a block by means of reflections, he began exploring the kind of interplay between interior and exterior spaces possible only with transparent glass. He was soon taking this approach to its logical conclusion, incorporating other materials, embracing large formats and developing ideas for pieces in urban and natural settings. One of these employed a series of shiny glass and metal diagonals to map out the space of a theatre foyer. Another consisted of a trail of glass and light inserted into a street so as to create a contrast between reality and the seemingly unreal. Yet another featured large hemispheres of transparent glass resting on the earth so that they reflected the sky and nearby treetops. Cigler sees such works as aiding people to exist in harmony with their surroundings. In this way he uses glass to investigate the cosmic order and its meaning. Cigler's work and installations have been displayed in Europe, North America and Asia. His work is included in numerous prominent collections, including Corning Museum of Glass in Corning, New York; Glasmuseet Ebeltoft in Ebeltoft, Denmark; Kunstsammlungen der Veste Coburg in Cobug, Germany; Musée des Arts Décoratifs in Paris, France; Slovakian National Gallery in Bratislava, Slovakia and Victoria & Albert Museum in London, England. Cigler is the recipient of numerous honors, including the 1968 Prize for Decorative Art of the Union of Czechoslovakian Fine Artists and Honorary Prize at the 1985 Zweiter Coburger Glaspreis in Coburg, Germany.