Zdeněk Sklenář: Reminiscing – About People, Events, and Experiences that Should Not Be Entirely Forgotten

In these unconventional memoires of Zdeněk Sklenář (1910–1986), one of the greatest Czech painters of the second half of the twentieth century,  the artist mentions meeting many important personae, and records his memories of his family, friends, and his entire life. The book was published after a more than twenty-year wait. The painter started writing his reminiscences in 1980, when he decided to stop painting. After his unexpected death in April 1986, the manuscript was taken over by the artist's close friend, Jiří Šetlík, who organised it and prepared it for publication by the Odeon Publishing House. However, Odeon went out of business at the start of the 1990s and Reminiscing was one of the titles that it did not get around to publishing.  The book was finally published in 2010 by the painter’s nephew and namesake, the gallerist Zdeněk Sklenář, to accompany the exhibition Zdeněk Sklenář: Ten Thousand Things – Ten Thousand Years, which was organised to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the painter's birth. The show was held at the House at the Sign of the Stone Bell in Prague from 17 March to 6 June 2010. Both the concept and the format of the book respect the original design prepared by Josef Týf for Odeon.  For the Galerie Zdeněk Sklenář edition, it was supplemented by an “Indian” chapter, which was found in Sklenář's estate, and, on the basis of the artist's original concept, it was expanded to included accompanying illustrations. Antonín Hartmann acted as the expert reviewer of the publication.

Special thanks to, in memoriam, the artist’s widow, Miloslava Sklenářová, for her cooperation in completing the book.