Photographer Karel Čapek (1890–1938) exhibition in Los Angeles 25. 6. 2025 – 25. 8. 2025
Curator: Helena Musilová
The exhibition Photographer Karel Čapek presents a lesser-known but extremely remarkable part of the work of this important Czech author – his photographic activity. Karel Čapek, known primarily as a writer, playwright and publicist, was also a passionate photographer. He pursued photography with the typical curiosity and attention to detail that we know from his literary work.
The exhibition offers a cross-section of Čapek’s photographic work across diverse themes – from poetic still lifes and civilian portraits to snapshots from travels, studies of nature and animals or everyday life in the house in Vinohrady. There are also images of his close friends, including T. G. Masaryk and his brother Josef. Attention is also paid to photographs of Dashenka, which Čapek took during her puppyhood. These photographs later became the basis for the now legendary book Dashenka or the Life of a Puppy. Čapek’s photographs are not technically perfect, but their unpretentiousness and authenticity give them a special charm. In many ways they correspond to his writing – civil, empathetic, human. The exhibition shows Karel Čapek as an observer of the world who sought beauty in the ordinary and managed to capture it with unobtrusive charm and perceptiveness. The photographs are not only a visual complement to his literary work, but also a unique testimony to the times in which he lived.
The exhibition was created in cooperation with The Consulate General of the Czech Republic in Los Angeles and the Czechoslovak Society of Arts & Sciences.
