Jindřiška Radová

* 1925

  • “[Artists who were officially approved during the communist regime] …half of them left, and half of them made their way out of it. Since they knew the situation, they got access to various positions. Artists lost everything. We had a kind of a fund. We had to give some of the money we earned from every work of art to the fund, and when we needed money for some future project, for example, we could borrow money from that fund. That was amazing. The money from fund was then somehow drained away. Nobody knows how it happened…!”

  • “They took a liking to the kind of work we did, they saw it at the exhibitions, and they approached us and dealt with us. They presented us their ideas for decorations. They came with some specific ideas about the authors. Unless it was a public tender for art objects for metro stations and similar places, we were then no longer prevented from participating. Metro was still out of question.”

  • “When Czechoslovakia became occupied by Russians, Pravoslav and I had a large exhibition in Munich. We slept in a hotel there and while we were eating breakfast, the waiters came to us and expressed their sympathy for us. We did not know what was happening. Then we were told that Russians had taken over our country at night. We were in Germany. Šárka was in Moscow, on some excursion with the Academy of Arts in Prague. We thus learnt about this and then there was the opening of the exhibition and we were standing there and crying and our eyes were red during the opening ceremony! We kept crying. What is going to happen? Pravoslav is on a blacklist, and when we go back to the border, will they arrest him? And what’s going on with our apartment in Prague? Well, we were absolutely desperate.”

  • “Then it was quite tragic for us, because father was involved in some resistance activity and people who were also involved in it began to be arrested. Certain Mr. Udržal shot himself, the wine shop owner Bálek was arrested and father shot himself in order to save the others. But the family absolutely did not know why; it all became revealed only after the war. We had no idea why father shot himself. I remember that I was sitting in the kitchen in the evening and father was sitting opposite me, and I was showing him what kind of dress I would like for my dancing lessons. And then it happened before the following morning. I was thus the last to see him.”

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    Praha, 15.04.2015

    (audio)
    duration: 02:47:19
    media recorded in project Stories of 20th Century
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What is accessible does not attract us. We only grow by overcoming

Jidřiška Radová, Einhod Symposium in Israel 1966
Jidřiška Radová, Einhod Symposium in Israel 1966
photo: soukromý archiv pamětnice

  Jindřiška Radová was born April 1, 1925 in Libkov near Seč. Her parents had a farm, but they let it for rent before the war and they moved to Chrudim where her father worked in the Slavia insurance company. Jindřiška’s father Antonín Švadlenka was involved in the resistance movement while the family was completely unaware of his activity. In 1940 Gestapo began arresting his co-workers and he decided to end his life in order to protect his colleagues and family. His suicide was a terrible blow to the family, and it was only after the end of the war when they learnt the true reason for this act. After higher elementary school Jindřiška went to study textile design at the Arts and Crafts School in Brno. After the war she continued at the Academy of Arts, Architecture and Design in Prague. During her studies she married Pravoslav Rada and their first daughter Šárka was born. After graduation in 1950 Mrs. and Mrs. Rada began to create ceramic works of art inspired by Pravoslav’s experience from his stay in Denmark. In 1955 they had their first joint exhibition. Three years later they successfully participated in the EXPO World Fair in Brussels. During the school year 1968-1969 Pravoslav Rada lectured at the university in Connecticut in the USA. Influenced by his American experience he decided to leave the Communist Party upon his return to Czechoslovakia. He was to feel the consequences of his decision later during the normalization era. Pravoslav Rada was not allowed to take part in any important competitions and tenders for works of art for public space. Jindřiška thus provided her own name as a cover name for her husband’s works. Both artists had to readjust to the new economic situation after 1989 and they started cooperating with the ceramics factory Royal Dux in Duchcov. Their work still enjoys success and draws great attention at exhibitions.