Databáze uměleckých výstav v českých zemích 1820 – 1950

The Exhibition of Bookbinding and Leather Crafts inaugurated what became known as the Permanent Industrial Exhibition in Prague, organized by the local Vocational School for Goldsmiths and Related Industries – the forerunner of the later School of Applied Arts in Prague. [Tichá 2025] The organizing institution hoped the exhibition would help raise its profile, as it was struggling with insufficient enrolment at the time. The displayed model works were intended to inspire both prospective and existing students in their independent work and design – the permanent showcase sought to compensate for the general lack of publicly accessible applied arts exhibitions and collections in Prague. In this way, it became an active participant in the Arts and Crafts Movement, which aimed to improve the declining aesthetic standards of industrially and handcrafted utility goods in the latter half of the 19th century. This reform involved setting up industrial museums with model collections of applied art, as well as schools where the concepts of uniting art, craft and industry were put into practice. Before these ideals fully took root in the Prague milieu with the founding of the Museum of Decorative Arts and its affiliated school in 1885, "applied art industries" mostly exhibited at public shows like this one. The exhibition was financed by one of its founders and then-chairman of the governing committee, the lawyer Kornelius Schäffner, and subsequently, following his death, by his widow, Ms. Augusta Schäffner. Regular contributions also came from Vojtěch Lanna Jr. and the Imperial-Royal Ministry of Trade. [Anonymous author 1885] Opening hours were daily from ten in the morning until three in the afternoon, free of charge, except on Tuesdays and Fridays, when a modest admission fee was charged. [Anonymous author 1875a]

The exhibition was installed in five rooms on the second floor of the courtyard wing of Portheim House on Ferdinandova Street, where the school was then located. However, these spaces were small and poorly lit, so the organizers opted for a rotating format of short-term, themed exhibitions, each showcasing a specific craft. The applied arts exhibition was, in fact, awaiting the completion of the Rudolfinum building, where it had been promised dedicated rooms. Once fully settled there, the Prague Chamber of Commerce and Trade planned to assume full responsibility for funding it. [Anonymous author 1885]

The exhibits came from several sources. In addition to the school's own holdings, they were largely loans from sister institutions – the Imperial-Royal Austrian Museum of Art and Industry in Vienna, the Imperial-Royal Ministry of Trade in Vienna, and the Industrial Museum in Brno – as well as from public and aristocratic libraries and archives, from private individuals including artists, architects, lawyers, and academics, and from contemporary manufacturers such as the court bookbinder Rost and Wunder & Kölbl of Vienna. [Anonymous author 1875a; Anonymous author 1875b] The exhibits included historical and contemporary examples of bookbinding in a wide variety of forms, ranging from richly ornamented covers with perforated metal plates to diverse leather bindings with carved, embossed, polychrome, and painted decorations, as well as simple modern forms. This arrangement is reflected in the bilingual Czech and German catalogue, which opens with a concise scholarly introduction to the history of bookbinding as illustrated by the exhibits displayed in each room. The catalogue further reveals that the show included not only originals but also copies, plaster casts, and photographs where originals were unavailable. Alongside book bindings, the exhibition featured other leather objects, including an assortment of cases, photo albums, frames, pouches, and similar items. An anonymous reviewer in the Bohemia wrote that the exhibition offered a relatively modest yet sensitively and judiciously chosen selection of the very finest objects. [Anonymous author 1876a]

The most outstanding examples of bookbinding were photographed, with the support of the Imperial-Royal Ministry of Trade, by Jindřich Eckert, who was already a well-known photographer by this time. An album containing forty mounted albumen prints must have been produced during the exhibition, as visitors could view and purchase it starting at the end of March. Contemporary opinion held that the photographs were distinguished by "excellent technical execution and affordability," and that their creator had "genuinely contributed to making the most of the exhibited objects." According to an anonymous reviewer, the publication ranked among the finest of its kind and was accordingly recommended to all applied arts schools as suitable reference and study material. [Anonymous author 1876a]

Press reports inform us that the Prague Chamber of Commerce and Trade requested the purchase of the album for the future Museum of Decorative Arts in Prague – the museum library indeed holds one copy of it. [Anonymous author 1876b] The photographs are kept in what appears to be the original cover, bearing the title of the exhibition and rich ornamental decoration. The album has a title page with a table of contents in which all photographed bindings are systematically grouped by technique, including information about the title, date, materials, provenance, and the name of the owner. A comparison with the exhibition catalogue reveals that only originals were photographed, except for one duplicate. The earliest binding dates from 1485, and the most recent is from the second half of the 19th century. The majority of bindings were photographed individually against a neutral, light background, en face, showing both the front cover and the spine – except for more recent volumes, which were photographed side by side in a row, as if standing on a library shelf. The impression created by the richly decorated bindings remains undisturbed throughout, even by the inclusion of a scale rule. This simple compositional approach corresponds to the standard visual conventions employed in photography of antique objects at the time.

In addition to the photographic album, the exhibition featured another notable addition: according to a December announcement in the Prager Abendblatt, papier-mâché toys from the Toy Industry Vocational School in the Ore Mountains were incorporated into the display and were also available for purchase. [Anonymous author 1875c] Although this somewhat disrupted the exhibition's thematic focus, collaborating with another vocational school within the monarchy fulfilled one of the show's aims: to contribute to the promotion and further development of industrially oriented educational institutions.

Denisa Tichá

Works Cited

Anonymous author 1875a: Anonymous author, Eine permanente kunstgewerbliche Ausstellung, Prager Abendblatt [IX] (Beilage zur Prager Zeitung), 1875, no. 282, 10. 12, n.p.

Anonymous author 1875b: Anonymous author, Stálá umělecko-průmyslová výstava, Posel z Prahy [VII], 1875, no. 294, 11. 12., n.p.

Anonymous author 1875c: Anonymous author, Kunstgewerbliche Ausstellung, Prager Abendblatt [IX] (Beilage zur Prager Zeitung), 1875, no. 289, 18. 12, n.p.

Anonymous author 1876a: Anonymous author, Ausstellung, Bohemia XLIX, 1876, no. 85, 26. 3., p. 4

Anonymous author 1876b: Anonymous author, Bucheinbände, Bohemia XLIX, 1876, no. 137, 18. 5., p. 5

Anonymous author 1885: Anonymous author 1885, Die Fachschule für Goldschmiedekunst und verwandte Gewerbe in Prag 1873-1885 / Odborná škola pro zlatníky a spřízněná průmyslová v Praze 1873-1885, Praha 1885

Tichá 2025: Denisa Tichá, Fotografie a výstavnictví 19. století v Čechách (diplomová práce), Ústav pro dějiny umění FF UK, Praha 2025, pp. 84–89

Further Reading

Jindřich Eckert, Bucheinbände aus der permanenten kunstgewerblichen Ausstellung der Fachschule für Goldschmiedekunst und verwandte Gewerbe in Prag, Praha 1876

Maren Gröning, Etablierung der Museumsfotografie. Die Fotografien des Österreichischen Museums für Kunst und Industrie 1864–1885, Rundbrief Fotografie. Sonderheft VI (Verwandlungen durch Licht. Fotografieren in Museen & Archiven & Bibliotheken), 2001, pp. 121–150

Lada Hubatová-Vacková – Martina Pachmanová – Pavla Pečinková (eds.), Věci a slova. Umělecký průmysl, užité umění a design v české teorii a kritice 1870–1970, Praha 2014

Gottfried Semper; Lada Hubatová-Vacková – Tomáš Zapletal eds., Věda, průmysl a umění / Wissenschaft, Industrie und Kunst, Praha 2016

Petra Trnková, Josef Kunzfeld. Fotograf a muzeum / fotograf a město (exh. cat., Moravská galerie v Brně), Brno 2011

Anonymous author, Ausstellung, Prager Abendblatt [X] (Beilage zur Prager Zeitung), 1876, no. 72, 29. 3., n.p.

Anonymous author, Bucheinbände, Bohemia XLIX, 1876, no. 137, 18. 5., p. 5

Anonymous author, Denní oznamovatel, Pokrok IX, 1875, no. 349, 18. 12., (advertisement), n.p.; no. 350, 19. 12., (advertisement), n.p.; no. 352, 21. 12., (advertisement), n.p.; no. 358, 28. 12., (advertisement), n.p.; no. 360, 30. 12., (advertisement), n.p.; no. 361, 31. 12., (advertisement), n.p.

Anonymous author, Komitét odborné školy, Pokrok IX, 1875, no. 321, 20. 11., n.p.

Anonymous author, Permanente kunstgewerbliche Ausstellung, Prager Abendblatt [IX] (Beilage zur Prager Zeitung), 1875, no. 264, 18. 11., n.p.

Anonymous author, Prager und Provinzialnachrichten, Prager Abendblatt [IX] (Beilage zur Prager Zeitung), 1875, no. 285, 14. 12., n.p.

Anonymous author, Stálá umělecko-průmyslová výstava v Praze, Posel z Prahy [VII], 1875, no. 276, 20. 11., n.p.

Anonymous author, Stálá umělecko-průmyslová výstava, Posel z Prahy [VII], 1875, no. 294, 11. 12., n.p.

Anonymous author, Tagesanzeiger, Prager Abendblatt [IX] (Beilage zur Prager Zeitung, advertisement), 1875, no. 283, 11. 12., n.p.; no. 285, 14. 12., n.p.; no. 286, 15. 12., n.p.; no. 287, 16. 12., n.p.; no. 288, 17. 12., n.p.; no. 290, 20. 12., n.p.; no. 291, 21. 12., n.p.; no. 292, 22. 12., n.p.

Anonymous author, Z Uměl. Besedy, Národní listy (supplement), 1876, no. 64, 5. 3., n.p.