David Cerny
| David Černý | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Born |
15 December 1967 Prague, Czech Republic |
| Nationality | Czech |
| Occupation | Sculptor |
David Černý (born 15 December 1967) is a Czech sculptor. His works can be seen in many locations in Prague.
Černý was born in Prague.
He gained notoriety in 1991 by painting a Soviet tank pink, to serve as a war memorial in central Prague. As the Monument to Soviet tank crews was still a national cultural monument at that time, his act of civil disobedience was considered "hooliganism" and he was briefly arrested.
Another of Černý's conspicuous contributions to Prague is "Tower Babies," a series of cast figures of crawling infants attached to Žižkov Television Tower.
In 2005, Černý created Shark, an image of Saddam Hussein in a tank of formaldehyde. The work was presented at the Prague Biennale 2 that same year. The work is a direct parody of a 1991 work by Damien Hirst, The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living. In 2006, the work was banned twice, first in Middelkerke, Belgium, then in Bielsko-Biała, Poland. With respect to the Belgian situation, the mayor of that town, Michel Landuyt, admitted that he was worried that the exhibit could "shock people, including Muslims" in a year already marred by tensions associated with Danish cartoons depicting the prophet Mohammed.
The Deputy Mayor of Bielsko-Biała, Zbigniew Michniowski, contacted the city-funded gallery, galeria BWA on 9 September 2006 and threatened dire consequences if the artwork were not removed promptly. In response, Shark was transported to the Szara gallery, in the nearby town of Cieszyn. The mayor of Cieszyn, Bogdan Ficek, distanced himself from Bielsko-Biała City Hall's values. "I can not see any reason a politician should censor art," Ficek said.
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