Poznámky k označení „moderní české“ v rané umělecké kritice

Abstract

The paper offers a brief summary of the period debate on the topic among leading national-minded commentators on the local and international art scene in Prague. It recalls the links of the label “national” to various contemporary concepts of patriotism and traces the articulation of the art scene in traditional and innovative contexts. The use of the label “modern Czech” for period visual culture has undergone many transformations, culminating at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries. At the time, local spokesmen for modernism asserted the difference between modern and period work. In doing so, however, they adapted some of the thought patterns from earlier domestic debates about art.