jaroslav malík

He studied at a secondary school in Sumperk and in 1998 graduated from ITF – The Silesian University in Opava. At present he teaches at the Secondary School of Art in Ostrava. Having come to Ostrava, I could not miss the treaded path made of paving blocks, Pavouk – Jama – Nibiru – 761 – Fiducia – Sokolska – DU, as well as those who walk on it. Popelar, Polasek, Smekal, Sigut, Zila, Balaban, Hudecci, Lysacek, Suruvka …
It is not worth writing about them, painting them or making their sculptures. I can’t do it anyway. I don’t know them enough to portray them in my studio. I choose pictures of pictures in the end. A pile of videotapes with ......in an old black-and-white Aurora offers the atmosphere of a single moment. I take pictures of the never-thought-of, almost intimate moments. Often they end up as almost absurd, comique or grotesque or in an ordinary, every day mood of the “actors”. I show them as they have fun in a pub, on a beach, at the opening of an exhibition, when they play football, are in a sweets’ shop, at the barber’s or elsewhere. Of course, I transform the picture that I take there – using large-format fotomontage – into a different picture, mine.
The final pictures are provided with name cards of those who took part. The name cards have a form of I.D. cards, so the spectators may compare such portraits, where all of us, of course, look so bad with the new, stylized ones where they suddenly look so good. And the title People Probable? To be honest, I’m not quite sure…

Yours faithfully Jaroslav Malik
Photographer, teacher, cyclist, cactuses breeder, etc