While the importance of the Bauhaus is widely understood, Czech avant-garde design of the same period remains under-appreciated.
Partly by virtue of its location in the heart of Europe, Czechoslovakia benefited from the free flow of progressive ideas – and absorbed Cubism, Dada, and polemics from Bauhaus, Dutch De Stijl and Russian Constructivist circles - to forge a distinctive contribution to the modernist avant-garde.
This was most dynamically expressed in mainstream book design – typography, cover design and layout – which, because of the political conditions prior to the late 1980s, is only now being properly assessed.
Druzstevní práce
Druzstevní práce (in English, Co-operative work) was a subscription based Czech publishing house that had gained popularity among the Czech middle classes in the 1920s for its consciously forward looking stance.
Sutnar become its principle art director in 1929, bringing his visionary approach to design to bear on all aspects of its output.
References
For
illustrations see:
Toman, Jindrich. The Modern Czech Book. Photo/montage in Print p. 339.
Ladislav Sutnar –
Prague - New York - Design in Action, Iva Janakova and Stephen Heller
(eds), Museum of Decorative Arts in Prague and Argo Publishers, Prague, 2003.
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