Regional cooperation partners: Městská galerie Litomyšl; Smetanova Litomyšl, o. p. s.
The main scope of this project is the preparation and execution of two exhibitions focusing on how academic work is interlinked with creative artistic work. The topics of these exhibitions will be appropriately related to the central theme of the Smetana’s Litomysl national music festival for 2025 and 2026, generally represented by the words ‘passion’ and ‘nature’. The aim of the first exhibition, to be held in 2025 and entitled Science in the Throes of Musical Passion, is to present Czech scientists during the transformations of society in the 19th, 20th and 21st centuries, whose relationship to music was far more than a mere hobby. From their student years, many of them waivered between their academic career and that of a professional composer or musician. Even though eventually, it was science that won over in their education and profession, music remained so important to them that they continued with it as a hobby, and often also as a semi-professional or even professional engagement. The exhibition will shed light on the unusual, interesting and inspiring lives of selected Czech scholars and their extraordinary relationship to music, as well as the often unexpected links between various fields of science, music and musical systems, not to mention how they influenced one another, both consciously and unconsciously.
