New Zlín Salon (House of Art)

The Zlín Salons continue the tradition of the historic salons that were held annually in Zlín from 1936 to 1948. These were the most extensive exhibitions of contemporary Czechoslovak—or Czech (from 1939 to 1944)—visual art. The revival of these exhibitions in the form of the New Zlín Salon took place in 1996 under the patronage of and with the participation of President Václav Havel. From the outset, the New Zlín Salon was conceived as a triennial. Since 2005, artists from Slovakia have also participated in the salon. As part of the New Zlín Salon, solo exhibitions of two renowned artists from the oldest generation were traditionally organized.

The concept of the exhibition gradually underwent various changes, for example, in the criteria for selecting artists, changes in the jury, accompanying events, and so on. The eighth edition marked the beginning of a new phase in which the project defined its theme more clearly. This subsequently led to the triennial adopting a new name, “House of Art,” starting in 2020. The name was not chosen at random. It refers both to the former main exhibition space of the salons in Zlín and to a time when the organizing institution functioned more as an exhibition platform and less as an art museum.

The archives of the New Zlín Salon and the Zlín Youth Salon can be found on a separate website: www.zlinskesalony.cz