Ester Krumbachová (1923–1996) worked as a theater artist beginning in 1953 – first in České Budějovice and later in Prague. She contributed to many important films of the Czech New Wave (Diamonds of the Night, Daisies, Valerie and Her Week of Wonders, A Carriage Going to Vienna, The Party and the Guests, A Carriage Going to Vienna, Witchhammer, Fruit of Paradise, The Ear, etc.). In 1970 she directed her only film, The Murder of Mr. Devil. From 1972 she was banned from contributing to feature films and television. She only worked occasionally on short films with Krátký Film Praha (Short Film Prague), film studios outside Prague, and several international productions. She was able to overcome the ban in 1983 when she and Věra Chytilová made The Very Late Afternoon of a Faun. After 1990 she was able to return to film once more, and her last job included script editing, scenery, and costumes for the film Marian (1996).
Ester Krumbachová is one of the crucial figures of Czech culture from the second half of the twentieth century; her characteristic literary style and original visual language determined the form of the visuals, script, and direction of a number of Czech films and plays and influenced many other artists. A number of the most significant works by leading directors such as Věra Chytilová, Vojtěch Jasný, Jaromil Jireš, Jan Němec, Petr Václav, Otakar Vávra, and Karel Kachyňa were created in collaboration with her. She also worked with prominent theater directors (Miroslav Macháček, Ladislav Smoček, Ivan Vyskočil), stage designers (Jaroslav Malina, Josef Svoboda), artists (Libuše Jarcovjáková, Jan Švankmajer, Jitka and Květa Válová), and musicians (Jan Klusák, Ivo Pospíšil, Ivan Král). Despite this, her work has not previously been comprehensively presented to either Czech or foreign audiences, in particular because her estate was only discovered in 2016.
The Ester Krumbachová Archive is not a historical cross-section of Ester Krumbachová’s work (although it does reflect this), but rather an extensive network of original material, the many texts, images, and artifacts with which Krumbachová occupied and surrounded herself throughout her life. Primarily, then, the archive presents Ester Krumbachová’s estate, in the form of interconnected thematic blocks that allow visitors to learn her thoughts on costume creation, especially the role of details and use of colors; the relationship between meaning, visual form, and the overall atmosphere of a film; her work with text copying the spoken word and human narration; and her relationship to magic, the universe, living organisms, cooking, love, death, subjectivity, male and female polarity, and the hierarchy of species as well as social and work positions. Her paintings and drawings, costume designs, jewellery, letters to friends (and cats), diaries, and private photographs are presented here. The archive thus represents both a reflection of influences and themes from her time and a diverse universe of multilayered and very original thought. It provides a view into the artist’s semi-public private life and her numerous struggles (in an unfree era) in both her creative and personal life.
The estate also appears as a series of notes and sketches that remain open and incomplete. The archive thus aims not just to emphasize the interdisciplinary nature of Krumbachová’s work, but also to show her work and way of thinking as a fully lively, dynamic, and inspiring environment for contemporary artists, designers, theorists, and historians of art and culture. Accordingly, the curators’ view on Ester Krumbachová’s work is constructed from a contemporary perspective. Not only was Krumbachová involved in many fields connecting film, literature, and fine and applied arts; strikingly, her way of thinking gives rise to topics that have only become fully developed in the present day. For example, the methods that Krumbachová used to enter into the essential moments and form of films from various positions (screenwriter, costume designer, director) have become clearer through the use of current theories of gender and media. This contemporary perspective is also reflected in the fact that the archive contains documentation of projects that have been created since 2016 in collaboration with a number of contemporary artists who have interpreted Ester Krumbachová’s work and life or applied similar lines of thought in their own work – for example, thinking through today’s positions on feminism; the rights of animals, plants, and other entities and ways of displaying them; culture; fashion; methods working with the inseparable intertwining of content and expressive form; and methods of direction in the broadest sense of the word.
The archive was made public in 2021 alongside a monographic publication and an exhibition on Ester Krumbachová at the Brno House of Arts, three interconnected outputs that cap off the critical treatment of the artist’s work. Since 2016, this research has linked different artistic and theoretical formats (exhibitions, performances, conferences, books, curatorial screenings) that, from the beginning of the research, have opened up the work of this crucial figure of the Czechoslovak New Wave to a range of interpretations and made it accessible to specialists and the broader public. The aim is to fill a gap in the history of costume creation, design, Czech and Czechoslovak film, and art in general.
Ester Krumbachová’s estate presents a relatively complete footprint of her lifelong activity and documents a holistic consideration of the artist that remains open for future creative generations. Thanks to the various layers of the archive, it is now possible to imagine the éminence grise of Czech film, a personality brimming with ideas and a longing to experiment; to show the tension present in her time between creativity and individuality; to view her work and the films of the New Wave in connection with the suppression of both creative and personal freedom by the official state apparatus demanding standardization and compliance; to connect the past and present; and to open many topics that are relevant in our current time.