5 Artists from the Eastern Bloc to Know
“The region’s art history suffers from lingering assumptions about Central Eastern Europe under communism […]. Yet a closer look at [art made in] Central Eastern Europe forces a different story to come into view: one full of artists pursuing material and conceptual adventurousness and experimentation and seeking ingenious and cunning negotiations of structures of power and authority.” —Pavel Pyś, Curator of Visual Arts and Collections Strategy at Walker Art Center
Charting a generation invested in experimentation, Multiple Realities: Experimental Art in the Eastern Bloc, 1960s–1980s sheds light on ways that artists refused, circumvented, eluded and subverted official systems.
Discover these artists at the Gallery now until April 21, 2025.
1. Věra Chytilová (1929–2014), Czechoslovakia
Věra Chytilová, Excerpts from Sedmikrásky [Daisies], 1966, 4K restoration from a 35mm film print, Courtesy Národnı filmový archiv/ National Film Archiv, Prague, Photos: Courtesy National Film Archiv, Prague, © Czech Film Fund
Věra Chytilová (1929–2014) was an avant-garde Czech filmmaker and activist who played a prominent role in the Czechoslovak New Wave of the 1960s. The first woman to study directing at Prague’s Film and TV School of the Academy of Performing Arts, Chytilová is most well known for her 1966 film Sedmikrásky [Daisies], a playfully surreal and feminist film that follows two young women who set out to prank the patriarchy that controls the world they live in.
The film played a major role in reinvigorating Czechoslovak cinema and challenging filmmaking conventions. Soon after, Communist Party censorship blacklisted Chytilová, preventing her from directing until a decade later.
2. Gabriele Stötzer (b. 1953), Germany/East Germany
Gabriele Stötzer, Nora und Gitti [Nora and Gitti], 1983, 3 hand-printed vintage silver gelatin prints on Baryta paper, sheep’s wool thread, Courtesy of the Artist and LOOCK, Berlin, Photo: Courtesy LOOCK, Berlin, © VG BildKunst, Bonn 2023
A rare voice of open dissent, German artist Gabriele Stötzer emerged among the alternative spheres of Dresden and East Berlin in the 1980s. She paid a high price for her activities. She was imprisoned for a year for signing a petition in support of exiled musician Wolf Biermann in 1977. Her underground gallery in Erfurt was shut down in 1981 by the Stasi, the East German secret police.
Often befriending punks, musicians and members of the LGBTQIA+ community, Stötzer created experimental Super 8 films and frequently included her own naked body in her work, breaking taboos and hierarchies to create alternatives to the officially sanctioned and state-permitted gender roles.
3. Alina Szapocznikow (1927–1973), Poland
Alina Szapocznikow, Kaprys – Monstre [Caprice – Monster], 1967, polyurethane foam, colour polyester resin, light bulb, electrical wiring, metal, cotton, fibreglass, Courtesy Hauser & Wirth, New York, Photo: Thomas Barratt, Courtesy Hauser & Wirth, New York, © ADAGP, Paris/The Estate of Alina Szapocznikow/Piotr Stanislawski/Galerie Loevenbruck, Paris/Hauser & Wirth
Polish artist Alina Szapocznikow (1926–1973) radically re-conceptualized sculpture as an intimate record not only of her memory, but also of her own body.
Born in Poland to a Jewish family in 1926, Szapocznikow survived internment in concentration camps during the Holocaust as a teenager. Immediately after the war, she moved first to Prague and then to Paris, studying sculpture at the École des Beaux Arts. In 1951, suffering from tuberculosis, she was forced to return to Poland, where she expanded her practice.
In the 1960s, she began to cast her own body in plaster, creating a series of sculptures examining the female body.
Despite her career effectively spanned less than two decades (cut short by the artist’s premature death at age 47), she left behind an important legacy as one of the most influential Polish artists of her generation.
4. Jürgen Wittdorf (1932–2018), Germany/East Germany
Jürgen Wittdorf, Baubrigade der Sportstudenten (from the Jugend und Sport series) [Sport Student’s Builders Brigade (from the Youth and Sport series)], 1964, linocut, Collection Andre Odier, Berlin, Photo: Courtesy KVOST, Berlin
Some artists found ways to express themselves within official systems. A member of the ruling Socialist Unity Party, German artist Jürgen Wittdorf was commissioned by the Academy of Sports in Leipzig to create Jugend und Sport [Youth and Sport] (1964). The linocut prints might seem to depict the heroic, strong men of Socialist Realism, the Soviet-promoted art style that featured idealized portrayals of workers and industry. But within this, Wittdorf quietly channelled hidden queer desire into officially acceptable imagery during a time when 2SLGBTQIA+ faced continued repression.
5. Bálint Szombathy (b. 1950), Serbia/Yugoslavia, active in Hungary
Bálint Szombathy, Selection from Lenin Budapesten [Lenin in Budapest], 1972, performance documentation in black and white photographs, Courtesy of the Artist and acb Gallery, Budapest, Photo: Courtesy acb Gallery, Budapest
Many artists used various approaches to explore or challenge the rules that governed everyday life in this period. Born in Yugoslavia, Bálint Szombathy played a critical role in both Yugoslavian and Hungarian art communities between the 1960s and the 1980s. During this time, he served as an important social connector, organizing artists’ group and facilitating the exchange of information about art on either side of the Iron Curtain through his publishing work.
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