Alén Diviš
| Alén Diviš | |
|---|---|
Solitude
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| Born | 1900-04-26 Blato u Poděbrady, Bohemia, Austrian Empire |
| Died | 1956-11-15 Prague, Czechoslovakia |
| Nationality | Czechoslovak |
| Known for | Painting |
Alén Diviš (26 April 1900 – 15 November 1956) was a Czech painter known for his melancholic art. Having spent much of his life abroad, often working in solitude, he remained rather unknown during his life but has had a postmortem revival in the art world.
Diviš was born in Blato u Poděbrady but in 1911, his the family moved to Prague. It was there that Diviš first attended painting lessons briefly attended the College of Applied Arts. In his early 20s, Diviš became intensely focused on art, particularly with cubism. In the summer of 1926, he moved to Paris to devote himself fully to his art. In Paris, he attended lectures by František Kupka and explored cubism, expressionism, and classicism. He made new friends in the French artistic community and maintained friendships with other Czechs there, such as composer Bohuslav Martinů. He began to travel further abroad, making trips to Spain, South Africa and the Netherlands. The first exhibition of his work took place in 1932 at Van Leer gallery.
In 1939, in reaction to the German occupation of Czechoslovakia, Diviš became increasingly political and, with other expatriates, formed the House of Czechoslovak Culture. Upon France's entry into the Second World War, Diviš and other members of the organization were arrested and charged with espionage. The reason for the arrests is unclear; perhaps their "sympathies for communism" caused suspicion, or it may have been their uncommonly celebratory reaction to the outbreak of war (which they hoped would lead to the liberation of Czechoslovakia). Whatever the reason, Diviš would spend the next six months in La Santé Prison, one of France's toughest. The sombre mood and the inscriptions and graffiti on the cell walls would inspire his later artistic vision. The charges of espionage were dropped, but Diviš would spend another year and a half in concentration and internment camps in France, Morocco, and Martinique before his eventual release.
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