The Hall of Honour of the Prague Quadrennial was originally intended for the classics of European stage design, for Craig, Appia, Hofman, Theo Otto, Oscar Schlemmer and others. The present time, which has discovered a new aesthetic coefficient in technics, returns quite programmatically to the beginning of this century as to its source of inspiration. This conception (which, on the other hand, would require the setting down of a compulsory sujet for all exhibits) would, in our mind, be very useful, because the material, arranged in accordance with such a conception, would exclude the possibility of epigonous works to be mistaken for real works of art, and it would also exclude a wasteful „discovering of America". It would, however, be impossible to fulfil this ambitious task in the short a space of time at the disposal for the preparation and realization of the Prague Quadrennial.
This is why the Hall of Honour has finally been reserved for the winners of the Sao Paulo Biennial, František Tröster, Josef Svoboda and Ladislav Vychodil, whose work apprehends the importace of the term „contemporary", with emphasis on philosophical, technical and aesthetic aspects. It should by right be completed by sets of Jiří Trnka, which, however, are at present dispersed in many exhibitions abroad and it would be impossible to collect them in time for the opening of the P. Q. This seems to be, at this moment, the only possible way to create a basis for the necessary comparison and to give proof of evolutionary continuities and tendencies, and of the value of present production. It is at this moment quite irrelevant that this is the work of Czechoslovak artists who have since 1959 been holders of Gold Medals awarded at the Sao Paulo Biennials. We have not endeavoured a reconstruction of these three exhibitions. This would be impossible in view of their extent and also in view of the development of the authors, aimed above the standard, which was petrified by one exhibition.
František Tröster, whose domain was the building up of dramatic space, aims, in his latest sets, at an analysis of the play - of the thought it contains — concentrating on one aspect which can be expressed in one precise term for which he then seeks a form. Studies for Shakespeare's Winter Tale marked „Time", „Storm" and „Landscape" and a number of designs for Janáček's operas may in this case serve as proof of his newly set scenographic aims.
Josef Svoboda experimented with all available technical means and from this elementary etude he derived conclusions which approach the laws of modern physics and their philosophical interpretation. This is the extreme point and the extreme measure possible to reach in the role of the design at this moment: the combination of its elements reveals the dynamic principle of the whole system which is characterised by a flow of continuously rising and vanishing structures. This kind of movement, these changes in relations, brought into existence in a configurative space, are adequately expressed by the term: spread out. The task of the designer, as understood by Svoboda, is not to describe or transcribe reality, but to create a multi — dimensional model in which spacial and time relations no longer function as independent separated and static schemes.
Ladislav Vychodil chooses an almost antagonistic direction: he aims at the emotional side of the theatre and finds its centre in the actor. Typical for his method is the width of space in which the actor may freely develop his movement, his action and expression, and out of which follows his theoretically precisely defined three-part composition: the scene is the background for the actor and the actor's costume is the background for his mask and his mime play. Thus the theatre may, with its own means, achieve details which have nothing in common with film details. It can also achieve a new emotion of colours and forms. Words apprehend only part of a work. It is first of all necessary to see a picture, which goes doubly for a scenic design which is only the starting point for the realization and, in addition, only one of the components of a complex dramatic.