The texts included in the last two volumes were mostly originally printed in the periodical press and date from Čapek's tenure at Lidové noviny, where he was in charge of the section on Prague exhibitions. He was a regular contributor to this newspaper from April 1921 until his arrest on 1 September 1939. He published hundreds of reports in it, in which he monitored artistic activities in the capital. Although he did not consider the daily to be a space for art criticism, his contributions to the newspaper cannot be read as mere informative articles about exhibitions in Prague. He almost never renounced his own evaluation, in which he expressed his distinct claim to artistic creation, which he himself applied to his painting. He followed the exhibitions of important artistic personalities and lesser-known artists and wrote with interest about their artistic achievements. He did not neglect women's art or the exhibitions of members of various artistic associations, such as German ones, and was one of the few who reported on them at the time. He reported on the exhibitions of foreign artists as well as the exhibitions of artists of applied art. In his artistic work he emphasised his own way of seeing and expressing himself, rejecting epigonism, routinism, conventionality, cheap spectacle and mannerism. Against academicism he emphasized creation based on one's own opinion and inner freedom. Above virtuosity he placed honestly achieved, albeit more modest, artistic results. His articles thus provide, in a critical perspective, a not exhaustive, but nevertheless clear picture of what was happening on the Prague art scene between the wars.
Czech edition