Education
Martin Velíšek graduated from the School of Industrial Art in Kamenický Šenov in 1983 and then from the glass-working department of the College of Industrial Art, Prague in 1989.
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Martin Velisek
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Academically, Velíšek’s work is commonly referred as grotesque, gothic, or absurdist. Velíšek himself avows a self-conceived school of "Parealism", and indeed the peculiarity of his artistic style eludes easy definition. While his exhibitions drew attention even in communist-era Czechoslovakia, it was his association with the popular avant-punk band Už Jsme Doma (where he holds the honorary title of “court painter“) in the 1990s that brought him broad public acclaim.
Other wide-ranging projects in that decade contributed to making his work widely recognisable: award-winning book covers like for the Czechoslovakian classic The Grandmother by Božena Němcová, his contribution to Aurel Klimt‘s animated film version of January Werich’s Fimfárum, and his embellishment of Prague-Žižkov’s famed tavern “At the Shot Out Eye” (U vystřelenýho oka), where his conceptions adorn everything from the tables to the head-rests he invented for the urinals.
A dominant theme in Velíšek’s work is man, or better put, the body of man, generally closed in a space in his nakedness or before a horizon, and treated with a specific kind of crooked, or comical, baseness, that creates a distinctly black sense of humour. The pictures always have a clear composition which, along with abundant use of writing, leads to a sort of Gothicism applied with equal measure to religion or public scenes.
This new precedent in the post-communist world of Czechoslovakian art, and the publicity that accompanied it, became a main factor in Matin Velíšek"s speedy and unsought-after celebrity. Velíšek has since been the subject of two documentary films for Czechoslovakian Television, Spring, Hell, Autumn, Winter (Jaro, peklo, podzim, zima, 1994) and The Civilian Parealist"s Studio (Ateliér civilistního parealisty, 1996).
