Orbis Fictus Re-Visited

Authors of the exhibits: Czech Digital Art Database (Databáze českého digitálního umění):
Research team: Adam Franc, Jana Horáková, Petr Macek, Monika Murgu, Štěpán Miklánek;
Web design and programming: Alina Matějová, Oliver Staša.

The exhibition recalls a milestone in the local history of digital art—the show Orbis Fictus: New Media in Contemporary Art (1995–1996; National Gallery Prague and the Municipal Museum and Gallery Polička). It is a remembering exhibition based on staging the results of historiographic research in the form of a database and an opaque installation of selected archival materials, documentation, and recordings of interviews with eyewitnesses.

We would like to thank the Centre for Contemporary Art Prague, Marta Smolíková, David Junek, Elen Řádová, Miloš Vojtěchovský, and Tomáš Ruller for providing archival materials and works from the original exhibitions in Prague and Polička. We would like to thank Jan Krtička for his sound intervention in the exhibition.

Acknowledgement: The exhibition was created as part of the project Local Digital Art and Culture as a Subject of Historiographical Research at the Faculty of Arts, Masaryk University in Brno. Grant provider: Czech Science Foundation. Grant number: GA24-10667S.

The exhibition was made possible through the generous financial support of the Statutory City of Brno and the Ministry of Culture of the Czech Republic.

Photo: Elen Řádová, Example of the artwork Sblížení (Closeness)