Franta

Franta (born 1930 as František Mertl) is one of the prominent representatives of figurative painting.

A native of Třebíč and a graduate of the Academy of Fine Arts in Prague, he has lived in southern France since 1958, where he adopted the artistic name Franta. However, he reestablished broken ties with Czechoslovakia in the late 1960s and early 1970s, when he made a name for himself in Paris and when his painting was purchased for the collection of the National Gallery in Prague. Nevertheless, his work, which centers on the human figure and the relationship of man to the world, remains largely unknown to the broader Czech public despite numerous exhibitions held. Thirty years after the first Prague retrospective at Karolinum, organized by the then Czech Museum of Fine Arts in Prague in 1995, the current exhibition at the Riding School of Prague Castle presents seven decades of the artist's work, including large-format ink drawings and bronze sculptures. It is held on the occasion of the award of a state honor of the Czech Republic to the artist in 2023. The works presented at the exhibition are loaned both from the author himself and from Czech and French art museums and private collections, including the National Gallery Prague, the Moravian Gallery in Brno, the Museum of Modern Art in Paris, and the National Center for Visual Arts in Paris. The exhibition is arranged chronologically, with the artist's work presented in chapters dedicated to individual decades; from this concept emerges its thematic heart, which focuses on the condemnation of violence and war. The relevance of Franta's work lies precisely in the artist's sensitivity to both the beauty and horror of human existence, which finds itself under the political, technical, or consumer pressure of modern society. His canvases are not only a testament to cruel injustice but also a call for solidarity with people in danger. The curator of the exhibition is Rado Ištok (National Gallery Prague).