Museum Montanelli

Professor Beneš’ Cabinet of Mysteries

“Because man is not the highest thing in the Universe”
Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 1141a

The exhibition’s ambition is to evoke astonishment at the blurred boundaries between ostensibly incompatible objects which, ultimately, jointly constitute one single sensory whole.  The works of art and collectors’ items on display should serve as inspiration to the viewer on the way to a realisation of the deeper connection and bond between nature, art and the micro- and macrocosm, or to an inner flight of imagination and individual interpretation, and so offer everyone their own particular Theatrum Mundi.  

The infinite variability of nature, its beauty and system of codification, whilst also its elemental potential for destruction and indomitable expansionary vitality, is perceived by many to be the work of God which has forever fascinated mankind.  It was and continues to be an inexhaustible source of inspiration (not only) for artists who have attempted to capture the elusive moments of its transformations, professing to be beguiled by its magnificence.  One of these, neurosurgeon Professor Vladimír Beneš, has lent the exhibition his entomological collection, which is to be in dialogue with other art works, videos and documentation from the Museum Montanelli collection.  

By the museum’s entrance, in its lower part, we come upon the purely imaginative, delicate and nature-entwined “inner” works of Anna Zemánková and Roman Franta that are housed in a separate cabinet.  From an adjacent landing we then look into a green dark cave where we can observe a video by the multi-media artist Jakub Nepraš, the refined conceptual work of the Japanese artist Keiko Koitabashi and the painting by Daniel Pešta with his video-art “Out of Nowhere“. We can also see here works by Paulina Skavová, Margot Margot, Jan Švankmajer and Cornelia Renz. In the upper, central part of the museum, where we step into the private collection of Professor Beneš, we find the conceptual artists Anke Röhrscheid and her work “Blood“, Luboš Plný with the work “My Nose is Bleeding“ and also a small collection of mildly amusing art objects.  All the artefacts are from the Museum Montanelli collection. This unusual composition is complemented by a seven-minute video of a brain operation lent by kind permission of both neurosurgeon Professor Beneš and his patients.  The Professor’s virtually complete lifelong entomological collection is to be seen in the main areas.  

A collection of nature products, drugs, plants and other items, including a microscope and documentation for “Wunderkabinett”, is installed in the museum’s lower part.  In the museum’s small cinema you may then watch the documentary film by Pavel Štingl on the workings of Professor Beneš’s neurosurgical department in the Military University Hospital of Prague.  

This exhibition also aims to act as an encouragement or invitation to the viewer to realise what is our common human desire to blend not just with nature itself but also with everything that is beyond us, maybe with the universe that by its nature surpasses man.  We are joined to the cosmos, we are part of it, our genes are only a negligible particle of a higher order. Multimedia objects, works of art and natural or obscure artefacts establish a mystery of perceptions and projection of the most sophisticated organ in our body, our brain.   

The exhibition has been organised in honour of Professor Vladimír Beneš.  

Other artists:
Özlem Akin, Roman Franta, Xénia Hoffmeisterová, Keiko Koitabashi, Margot Margot, Jakub Nepraš, Daniel Pešta, Luboš Plný, Cornelia Renz, Anke Röhrscheid, Paulina Skavová, Jan Švankmajer, Anna Zemánková, Jitka Štenclová

Exhibition curator, text: Dadja Altenburg Kohl

9. 6. 2021 – 20. 3. 2022 (extended)