History of the Collection

When the gallery was founded in 1953, the collection was based on the holdings of the former Baťa company (Svit National Enterprise). It was built primarily through acquisitions from the Zlín Salons and other major exhibitions of contemporary art that took place in the 1930s and 1940s, as well as through acquisitions from private collections. It consisted of a set of more than 800 paintings, sculptures, drawings, and prints from the 19th and 20th centuries, primarily of Czech origin and, to a lesser extent, of Slovak origin. To a certain extent, this collection foreshadowed the direction of the institution’s future development. Among the most valuable contributions were artworks by Toyen, Jindřich Štyrský, Emil Filla, Jan Zrzavý, Bedřich Stefan, and many others.

From the mid-1950s, the gallery purposefully monitored and collected works of artistic merit emerging in the Czech lands during that period, while also emphasizing significant artists associated with the region. The 1950s and 1960s were among the most fruitful periods for building the collection, when the most valuable acquisitions included artworks by leading figures of Czech modernism (Bohumil Kubišta, Josef Čapek, and others), as well as artworks by contemporary artists (Václav Boštík, Mikuláš Medek, Jan Koblasa, Vladimír Boudník, and others). The next phase in the gallery’s history was the era of normalization, which, although it brought a decline in high-quality contemporary art, still saw the collection continue to grow, for example with additional works by classics of Czech art (such as Antonín Slavíček, Rudolf Kremlička, and Alfons Mucha).

Following the sociopolitical changes of 1989, the gallery focused primarily on building a valuable collection of art from the second half of the 20th century, which had previously not been particularly sought after in public galleries (Karel Nepraš, Naděžda Plíšková, Otakar Slavík, and others). At the same time, the gallery began laying the groundwork for expanding its research program to include the functionalist architecture of Zlín, which is documented through plans, drawings, photographs, and models. In recent years, more systematic attention has also been devoted to the design collection, which focuses on artifacts primarily related to the institution’s geographical area of operation, with a special emphasis on industrial design. In line with the strategy of capturing the transformations of contemporary art in a more comprehensive manner, the scope of acquisitions continues to expand beyond the boundaries of traditional media toward newer forms, such as photography, video, and multimedia installations.

The collection of the Regional Gallery of Fine Arts in Zlín currently comprises nearly 7,000 works and, within the framework of four subcollections, can be divided into several categories: paintings / sculptures / drawings / prints / architecture / design / new media.