Today, artists of tomorrow draw on paper what we should see hovering in space or what should be projected on the sky.

— F. Kalivoda, 1941 Excerpt from the preface to “Kinetismus”, a book by Zdeněk Pešánek —

A visionary, that's what a creator whose thoughts were ahead of technologies of his time is a posteriori called. Zdeněk Pešánek surely belongs to this category of artists. His light-kinetic sculptures designed for the public space in the 20s and 30s of the previous century were created only at a cost of a complex, tedious and never totally satisfying work. Though to make his multimedia assemblies, Zdeněk Pešánek was using the most innovative elements and materials of the time: celluloid, light bulbs and neons.These imperfect tools were not translucent enough to diffuse light properly, and were too fragile to withstand adverse weather conditions and their life span was therefore limited. Moreover, acoustic reproduction techniques were still in their infancy and didn't allow for permanent addition of sound to objects or its synchronization with movement and light. It's therefore no surprise that none of Pešánek's original light-kinetic sculptures has been preserved in public space until today. (..)

Zdeněk Pešánek as an authorof atypical, hybrid and timeless works of art represents an emblematic reference for a space dedicated to artistic creativity in all its diversity.

Chistelle Havranek

https://www.kunsthallepraha.org/en/blog/transformace-pesanek-diaz (18.01.2020)