Theorist and organiser. He graduated in art history from the Faculty of Arts at Charles University in Prague, and was awarded a PhD degree in 2006 (dissertation: Authentic Structures, Personalities and Structures of Interpretation in Czechoslovak Art 1949 – 2004). He worked as a curator of the Modern and Contemporary Art Collection of the National Gallery in Prague (1996 – 1998), and the Prague City Gallery (1998 – 2002). Since 2002 he has been the director of the Transit.cz Contemporary Art Initiative, which he co-founded. He lectures on contemporary art at the Academy of Arts, Architecture and Design in Prague. Vit Havránek is a co-founder of the Pas group (production of present-day activities, along with Tomáš Vaňek and Jiří Skála). Havránek’s theoretical studies cover a number of artists distinguished by their reviewed interest in the new forms of Conceptual art (Ján Mančuška, Jiří Skála) at the turn of the 20th and 21st centuries. Havránek is credited with a new perception of the work produced by Jiří Kovanda, Július Koller and Stano Filko. He was the curator and co-curator of the exhibitions: Manifesta 8, The European Biennial of Contemporary Art, Murcia, Cartagena, Spain; Monument to Transformation, 2007 – 2010, Centro Monthermoso Vitoria; Transit – Auditorium, Stage, Backstage, Frankfurter Kunstverein, Frankfurt am Main (2006); Me, exhibition in three acts, Secession, Vienna (2006); Definition of Everyday Life, Prague Biennale 2, Prague (2005); Lanterna Magika, Espace Electra, Paris (2002); Jiří Kovanda, DUMB, Brno (2004); Otto Piene, Prague City Gallery, Prague (2002); action, word, movement, space, Prague City Gallery, Prague (1999) and a few others. He is an editor of the publisher jrp | Ringier Art Publisher, Zürich (Transit series: Atlas to Transformation, Jiří Skála, Kateřina Šedá, Jan Mančuška, Jiří Kovanda, and so on), editor of books and exhibition catalogues: Autobiographies (2006); The Need to Document (2005); Lanterna Magika (2002); action, word, movement, space (1999). His essays were published in books and catalogues: Manifesta 8, Silvana Editoriale (2010); Promesses du passé, Centre Pompidou (2010); Reconsidering Documentary and Contemporary Art, Sternberg Press, CCS Bard (2009); Voids, Centre Pompidou, Kunsthalle Bern (2009); Right About Now, Valiz (2007); Yves Klein, Centre Pompidou, Springer Vienna, New York (2007), and many others. Havránek publishes his essays and articles in Artist, Springerin, Manifesta Journal, Flash Art and a few others. He lives and works in Prague.
photo: Martina Koštanská
