Šejn Miloš *1947

Zebin, 1977

Oil on canvas, 145 × 120 cm, signed on the reverse by Miloš Šejn, Zebín ostatek, 1977 on a blindframe in the author's hand Miloš Šejn, Zebín ostatek, 1977
The painting Zebín, 1977, represents the artist's typical plein air painting of this period and is also one of the paintings with which Miloš Šejn completes his his studies at the Zdeněk Sýkora School, begun in 1974. Quarry at Zebín inside a distinctive basalt hill on the edge of the Bohemian Paradise is the author's important theme, which he treats with a myriad of techniques starting with drawings, paintings, photographs and then many actions since the end of the 1960s. The artist has been working on a series of paintings and photographs from the 1960s to the present day. Miloš Šejn *1947 in Jablonec nad Nisou, graduated in 1975 Philosophical Faculty of Charles University in Prague. In 1976 he received Ph.D. in philosophy in 1976, and in 1991 he was appointed professor of painting. In the years 1990-2011 he was the head teacher of the intermedia studio at the Academy of Fine Arts in Prague and as a guest teacher at the Academies in Aix-en-Provence, Carrara, The Hague, Ljubljana, Stuttgart and Vienna. He works in the fields of visual art, performance, deals with visual perception and organizes workshops such as Bohemiae Rosa. His artistic concept has been shaped since his youth, when he made many journeys through the wilderness as a reflection of his inner need to get closer to the mysteries of nature and to observe the wonder that occurs there. From the beginning the 1960s, while wandering, he photographed, drew, collecting and describing his observations. His current focus is on the immediate creative possibilities based on the relationships of the historical humanized landscape and the whole of nature. He consciously labours with areas of expressive language between text, visual trace, bodily movement, voice and expansion into space. In addition to her truly remarkable project in the Czech Republic (Sluneční hora), Šejn has permanent or processual landscape realizations in France and Germany. He has also worked with landscapes in Norway, Sweden, The Netherlands, Italy, Poland, Austria, Slovenia, Croatia, Ireland and Iceland. He has exhibited since 1970 in numerous galleries throughout Europe and overseas, National Gallery in Prague, Moravian Gallery in Brno, ifa Gallery Berlin, Zentrum für Kunst und Medientechnologie Karlsruhe, Ludvig Forum für Internationale Kunst Aachen, MAC Musées d'Art Contemporain Marseille, Mücsarnok Budapest, Manggha Museum in Krakow, MWW Museum of Contemporary Art in Wroclaw, Uppsala Art Museum, Palazzo Grassi in Venice, Museum of Fine Arts Houston, Indianopolis Museum of Art, MoMA PS1 New York. The offered painting titled Zebin from 1978 is from the early period of Sheyn's early years, when he painted the surrounding countryside en plein air under the influence of Sýkor Sýrek's training at the Faculty of Arts, Charles University in Prague. It depicts a distinctive basalt hill on the edge of the Bohemian Paradise, which became the site of many of his important ritual events, paintings, drawings and photographs from the 1960s to the present. The painting is created here by means of splashes of colour that shift a particular landscape motif to the edge of abstraction, with its use of colour as the main element of the work component. The distinctive colouristic quality of the painting shows Šejna's painterly talent. Miloš Šejn's conceptual and procedural works in various multimedia positions are always based on a key theme - nature, which the author has been he has been attracted to and fascinated by nature since his youth. The works created in the open air are based on from the performative act of physical presence and physical experience in direct contact with natural forces and their magical nature. Painting, drawing or action art are a means for a processual record of the emerging in direct contact with the soil, rocks and other natural elements and the surrounding space. The artist has received international acclaim, his work can be found in major international collections and galleries.