The permanent exhibition The Art of Asia will close for good on February 25, 2018, so take this last opportunity to see the most interesting Asian artworks in the Kinský Palace. The winter rotation we have prepared will include a special selection of paintings and prints. You can see work by the greatest 20th-century Chinese painter Qi Baishi, by Li Keran and Xu Beihong or 18th-century Indian miniatures. Several Chinese paintings purchased by President Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk will also be displayed. Masaryk visited an exhibition of Chinese art from the Josef Martínek Collection in 1931 and chose 96 artworks that he bought with money from his “jubilee fund” for future National Gallery in Prague collections. These artworks, among them the most interesting examples of Chinese painting in our country, were not transferred from the Prague Castle collections before 1953. The current presentation also includes early Japanese wood block prints, contemporary calligraphy, examples from the unique cycle The Book of Fans and, as the Artwork of the Season, a newly acquired lacquered plaque with a portrait of Jean Domat. The National Gallery in Prague bought this oval copper portrait plaque, covered in natural lacquer and produced by the Sasaya workshop, this year. Today, Czech public collections house only two plaques of this type, aside from the one on display. One bearing a portrait of Tycho de Brahe is housed in the Museum of Decorative Arts in Prague and the other with a portrait of Emperor Joseph II can be found at State Chateau Kynžvart.
Curators: Markéta Hánová, Jana Ryndová, Zdenka Klimtová, Michaela Pejčochová
