Pavel Ryška: Tajná a veřejná strašidla Radka Pilaře
The AFAD Department of Theory and History of Art invites you to a lecture by Pavel Ryška on the work of Radek Pilař, from popular book illustrations and animation to private intermedia experiments. Monday 19 October 2026 at 2 p.m., room 135, Hviezdoslavovo Square 18.
- Monday 19 October 2026 at 2 p.m.
- AFAD, Hviezdoslavovo Square 18, Bratislava, room 135
- Organised by the Department of Theory and History of Art at AFAD
Pavel Ryška
Tajná a veřejná strašidla Radka Pilaře
The legacy of Radek Pilař (1931–1993) is extraordinarily extensive and varied, and marked by a split between official work and private experiments. The artist’s personal decisions and political circumstances seem to have left us with two different creators: a popular illustrator of fairy-tale books and maker of animated children’s television stories, and an intermedia artist who privately brought together spontaneous painting, photography, performance, film and eventually electronic images in his studio. Pilař’s approach to the book as a medium was similarly diverse and layered. The lecture will present his toy books as places to develop imagination and fine motor skills, private repositories for secret dreams and fantasies, and frames for arranging fragments of unrealised films.
Pavel Ryška (born 1974) graduated from the Faculty of Fine Arts at Brno University of Technology and completed a doctoral programme at the Centre for Audiovisual Studies at FAMU in Prague. He currently works at the Audiovisual Technologies Studio at FaVU. He lectures on Czechoslovak visual culture and the history of animated film and comics. His studies cover promotional graphics, illustration, visual humour and satire during the communist dictatorship. He wrote Karikaturisti. Polylegran a obrazový humor 60. let (Paseka, 2018). His edition of Jaroslav Malák’s comic series Háček + Čárka (Paseka, 2024) received the Muriel Award for contribution to comics, and his monograph České spotřební pohádky (2024) received the Golden Ribbon award.
The lecture is part of the KEGA 003VŠVU-4/2026 grant project Priestor knihy. Kniha ako médium integrácie umelecko-dizajnérskych prístupov.