Rendezvous Problem 4: Punctum

Oldřich Semerák & Martin Netočný

11. 06. 2025, 4 PM

National Gallery at the Veletržní palác, permanent exhibitions

Dukelských Hrdinů 47, 170 00 Praha 7-Holešovice, Czechia

The fourth session in the Rendezvous Problem series, with theoretical physicist Oldřich Semerák and artist Martin Netočný, will take the form of a guided tour through some of the rooms in the permanent exhibitions at the National Gallery’s Veletržní palác. The event will be conceived as a paraphrase on the Rorschach test, using exhibited artworks as the starting points of interdisciplinary conversations. Rather than claiming a common language between art and science, the dialogue between Semerák and Netočný is designed with an awareness of the often disjunctive semiotic systems of the two fields. From this perspective, the exhibited paintings or sculptures - considering their potential as triggers for imagination and without historicising tendencies - are tested as springboards that could metaphorically bridge the misunderstandings emerging when different conceptual fields come together.

Oldřich Semerák is a theoretical physicist working in the areas of general relativity, relativistic astrophysics and black-hole space-times. He has published extensively on topics such as spinning particles in general relativity, gravitating disks around black holes and relativistic motion forces that might enable an intuition of space-time geometries. He is a professor at the Faculty of Mathematics and Physics, Institute of Theoretical Physics. 

Martin Netočný is a curator working at the GHMP and a photographer. He is currently also a doctoral student at the Department of Theory and History of Art at the Academy of Fine Arts. His research focuses on the influence of posthumanist philosophy on artistic practice. His works have been presented in more than ten group and several solo exhibitions in the past. He regularly writes reviews and other cultural and journalistic texts. 

The event will be in Czech. The meeting point is at the ticket desk on the ground floor at 15:45. The entry is free, with the kind support of the National Gallery.

The project is a cooperation between

The Academy of Fine Arts Prague / LARGE - Laboratory for Art, Research and Graduate Education and Velrybí srdce, z.s

Organised by Anetta Mona Chișa, Irina Gheorghe, Jakub Podgorný.