Imago Summer 2009 [antikvár]

my favourite photograph ONE PHOTOGRAPH BY JINDRICH STREIT Strdnske 1980. Black and white photograph of a man and a woman on the bed. Wide lense depicts TV set in imitation wood case, simple family bed covered with two blankefs, dress hanging on the wardrobe, wall with regular strips of flowers. There are three pictures hanging over the bed. The married couple is hugging each other in front of the television. How idyllic. This photograph is not one of those famous ones, taken by Sovinec photographer Jindfich Streit, and is also a little bit too much sadly silent. But it is this atmosphere, which comes to my mind when I think about his work. The new phenomenon of television infiltrated Czech countryside during 1970s and Streit observed if systematically. To own the TV set meant, among other things, to confirm the social status. It changed the traditional daily routine and sitting in front of the hypnotizing screen gives the new urgency to the feeling of relation between home and outland, between direct personal experience and global space. Television is the personalization of dreams, politics and hobby. We con see only back side of it on the photograph. The improvised placement in front of the window is evident, therefore the look of man and woman towards the TV screen is in the some direction as the one from the window. They can freely click between here and there and compare. Temporariness is also projected onto the setting and awkward space. Man and woman, still in the working cloths, ore lying on the bed and smoking cigarettes, which is not typical for the daily routine of the village. We are in the former Sudeten-land, in the early eighties. The depicted photograph from the Stránské village is not one of those mysterious and even surrealistic, such typical for Streit. But in spite of that, there ore obvious elements of absurdity displayed here. We con find them in this strange meeting of saint picture with the pietic and retrospective picture of soldier -border guard and his dog. The icon of socialism: "On guordl" next to the sentimental religious oleograph uncovers two principles, which formed the specific phenomenon of collectivized village: rural tradition mingled up with the ideology of working class. The image also reveals another typical aspect of Streit's work: Personalness. That's how I would refer to this intimate snapshot taken in the bedroom - which is clearly drown and prohibited for stranger to enter in the houses of rural community - and at the some time the relation between the author and the photographed. The Pinkes ore aware of being photographed, but the certainty of the situation which they everyday live through and the place they both know so well gives them confidence and picture looks life-like. As to the rest, it is not the first photographer's visit. It is not intention of Jindrich Streit to take unattended snapshots. With mutual understanding, he knows how to make people trust him. He spends o lot of time with them, comes bock and seeks for that right image. He captures eternity. Jindrich Streit is the chronicler of the village. The village is the world. TOMÁS POSPECH