Rudolf Stockar

Rudolf Stockar belonged to the generation of architects born at the end of the 19th century who had the opportunity to go through many architectural styles that changed during the first half of the last century on the axis of architectural history. His work includes Art Nouveau and Geometric Modernism, as well as Cubism, Art Deco, Purism and Functionalism. His theoretical interests included garden cities as an urban structure for even the poorest classes of the population, or the issue of applied art and the art industry. He was the founder of the Association of Czech Artists Artěl and was even its director from 1915 to 1926. Artěl was, like the Bauhaus, an association of artists, designers and theorists that aimed to highlight the culture of living and the quality of lifestyle while ensuring the production and sale of its members' designs. Rudolf Stockar designed a variety of utilitarian objects for Artěl, from jewellery and textiles to furniture and entire interiors. However, his main domain was jewellery, which he worked with as a small refined architecture. His portfolio also includes small objects such as brooches, smoking accessories, vases and coffee or tea sets, which are characterized by exquisite material workmanship and extraordinarily sophisticated shapes. Barbora Kovářová