SELF-SPONSORED

SELF-SPONSORED
Patrik Pelikan

Exhibition duration: 26 June - 7 September 2025

Often it happens that the mason and the wall do not meet and remain lonely voices between which the work hangs. It's as if they're being directed by someone else and therefore can't see each other. Even if the mason is not always the head of the building, he still has his hands left. But what can the wall do? The construction in the gallery Olga attempts to bring the two actors closer together: she has the mason unroll the wall so that it can step out without being held up again, and yet not fall down. For both of them, their own stability will be at stake, as well as the opportunity to denounce what their role is suffering from.
The first phase of the construction will culminate on Wednesday 25 June with an opening day - an inspection day, during which a meeting will take place in the skeleton of the wall and over a construction adventure that will show the position of the builder and the wall being built not only in the process, but also from a distance. In the second phase, the plastered wall will then be confronted with the self-talk of the wall and the mason.

Third exhibition of the cycle Dr.Art for 2025 at the Olga Space Gallery builds on the themes of previous editions by focusing on the conditions in which art is created and by defining art as a possible tool for overcoming deep social crises.

CONSTRUCTION DIARY

On Monday I started to dismantle the mock-up walls for Jilska. They lasted in the workshop for almost a year, because I haven't done any business there since August. Now the room is cluttered with materials from the fall show (bags of clay, bamboo, fasteners) and more, the ones from the mock-ups, will be coming. At the same time, the perimeter walls have filled up with tests from even older events, so there is just enough time to sort and clear away the accumulation. I have a similar situation with construction logs and annotations for the last few years. Organizing is imminent just as spring is in full swing. All sorts of bushes are just starting to bloom, and I'm putting together notes for the AVU audition on my idea of how to function in the workshop: to what extent a dose of clutter is necessary for inspiration, and when overwhelm frustrates and hinders focus and new work.

So on Monday I will knock down the first smaller partition and knock the clay mortar out of the bamboo mat. On Wednesday, I'll dismantle the second one, which is more waste because it's covered in hardboard, and more work sifting out the mortar. I'll recycle what I can, but I'll get to dusting and pulling screws out of the battens on Friday. By then, I've already got a few sketches in my notebook of the first thing I thought I might do in the Olga gallery: unfolded partitions on an elliptical plan. I feel I should show the exhibition somehow from the inside, in process, and connected to the self-talk that echoes in my head as I work. But how to make the wall speak? The dates of the exhibition are from June to September, and it will be open only occasionally. Inside, however, it will be visible from the street through a large window, and this view can be counted on. But it's a long way to the Olga Gallery. Before filling it up again, I first have to sort out the space in my workshop and in my head. Then to build the model, etc.

In the meantime, my construction on Výtoni is delayed because I'm waiting for materials. Advantage for Olga, yet I don't get to work on the show easily. Sometimes I'm held up by orders, sometimes by the audition materials. Most of all, I'd like to mop the dusty floor in the workshop. I only get around to preparing a model when I think I can't get around anything. First I convert the measurements and cut the parts out of cardboard. Not to be short of excitement, Martin H. from Liberec Architecture calls me (we met six months ago in Jilská) and invites me to a workshop in Slavonice in May, which Rezek once offered, where architects get to touch traditional craftsmanship. It's tempting to make a projection between disciplines, after all Protoarchitecture was founded in Liberec. I'll meet you in a week and invite more. Now to finish the model.

I sketch mainly on the tram and my drawings have settled on the design of a wraparound partition. It's hard to come up with anything else. I'm monotonously repeating the volute floor plan and I'm annoyed by the square gallery layout because all the designs revolve around a circle. Time to compare ideas with the model. The rising height of the partition and the penetration of light should give dynamism to the crawl, only I can't draw that. What should happen during the crawl? Through the window or the inner entrance I see a room that is filled with a building - a separate partition. I enter it and watch the wall receding. As I walk, the light diminishes, the passage is tight and high into the ceiling. In such a shell, one would like to say that the walls have surrounded me. Yet it's still the same partition, only it has two sides: a convex one that points towards the gallery walls and a bulging one that turns away and guides me inside the tangle. One stream, two banks. Opposite an erosion with sediments and inside a stagnant pool.

I'm thinking of Olga, it's just that the events of the last month haven't allowed me to continue with the installation. I was finishing the construction on Výtoni, followed by the promised workshop of clay plasters in Slavonice, then immediately to pair up in Třeboca and a while later to dig the facade in Činěvsi. In the meantime, a long preparation for the audition at AVU. There was neither time for Olga nor for self-talk. At most, I was on the tram reading and editing the latest construction diaries.

Finally auditioned yesterday, workshop today. I would build or paint something right away, but my intuition holds me back and I draw spirals on the wall instead. Then, on the same scale, I try a curled cable on the floor below to make a floor plan of the partition. The only thing I can grasp in my planning is the limiting width of the passage between the walls. My guess is that in a space narrower than half a metre, I wouldn't climb four metres to the ceiling. I also build a scale model of the rafters from leftover bamboo and climb back and forth with it in the floor plan, trusting that the ascension will show me what the wrapping of the partition should look like. Again, only the limits come to light: build so that the builder can still fit the structure.

It's raining any minute now and I'm getting stressed from the anticipation of the installation. I'm distracted and have trouble writing a single email in the morning. It keeps me so busy that I don't go to the workshop. I don't really know what I'm doing. After lunch, I take a bath, go outside and pick a bag of elderflowers. In the afternoon I'm on the phone with Dita, when I outline my plan to build a wraparound partition, let the wall do the talking, and give the builder a voice. I suggest the title, Self-contained, and also the idea of conceiving the opening as a control day: a meeting on the site inside the skeleton of the wall, where research for my dissertation could also take place. Dita agrees; I've already started to write the annotation.

I can't do much more with the model in the workshop, so I draw a plan of the inner wrap, put the battens together and start building the wall frame. I'd prefer not to tie the upright uprights together with any spars and try to join them with bamboo or sololite only. But who knows what will happen when I cut the upright uprights that anchor the wall. Won't the bent bamboo or sololite beat stretch the wall so much that it will collapse? I measure the concern about tension against the idea of letting the wall stand on its own but not collapse.

A week to installation, I'm anxiously counting down the days. In the workshop, the construction is waiting, just to start beating it with bamboo mats. Today, however, I'm just tying the stands horizontally with individual straws while inflating the grid so the mats don't fall when unrolled. I got a new saw this morning and all morning instead of pounding, I cut wedges from the waste wood. The saw cuts towards me, so I want to get a reverse shot before the action.

I'm counting every hour. There's a lot of work involved in beating up old mats: pulling out staples, watering broken straws, etc. I can only do half the construction in a day.

My head is clouded with a hangover. I'll finish beating the mats and leave the inside for tomorrow. I want it smooth and flat, so I'm going to cover it with hardboard. I'd have to plaster the sketch, but I don't have time and I'm sorry about the material. How the wall will hold up and how the plaster will work or crack will be an adventure that I will evaluate in Olga.

Tomorrow I'm leaving for the facade in Chineves, so today is the last chance to try something before installation. I'm redoing and photographing the model for the sake of the invitation, and instead of the sololite backfill I'm hastily beating the inside of the partition with bamboo stalks. I want to save time and material. Then I hastily undercut half of the uprights and my surprise is replaced by anger at how baggy the wall is. I fumble and console myself that this is an experiment. Next time, I need to stagger the undercutting and, more importantly, gauge how the wall will behave when it's beaten with sololite and weighted down with clay. I don't have it down and I can't do the math. I put stability at risk and recall a rumor about the construction of the vault at Charles when the masons didn't believe the vault would hold, refused to demolish the scaffolding, and the builder had to set it on fire. You couldn't see through the smoke and as the burning scaffolding fell, he stopped believing in the vault and ran to drown himself in the Vltava River. But the vault survived and outlived the builder and the masons.

Monday 16. 6.
In the morning I prepare things to be taken to Zbraslav and in the morning Dita and I go to Olga. On the way we buy bamboo and order prisms, which fortunately will be delivered in the afternoon. Once we've worked out the organizational details at the gallery, I go to draw the floor plan of the Self-contained: I measure the limits for the passages between the partition and the perimeter walls, then draw a spiral partition between them with a cable and outline it with chalk. Before that, I manage to cut a scrap from the rest of the previous installation.

Tuesday 17. 6.
First I buy the nuts for the bolts, then I have to measure and draw the positions for the stands in the floor plan. Before noon, Vít'a brings me the miter gauge and before Lucie, with whom I am building the first racks, comes to help me, I extend the racks from the leftover prisms, because I can't reach the ceiling from mine. Because of the short poles I barely slept and in the morning I would almost be buying longer ones from the half-dark. Anxiety that I might not be able to hug the wall.

Wednesday 18. 6.
In the morning, again measure and plot the positions of the stands, at the same time formatting the battens and hammering in the regulating screws. A lot of tasks at once, but as soon as I catch the rhythm, calmness sets in: I don't worry about what should be where, I go in order. In the afternoon Lucia and I will build another portion of stands, the last few will be left for Friday. The densely built racks gave the skeleton the dimension of a jungle gym.

Thursday 19. 6.
Stretched day: by the time I figure out how to measure and cut the sprites between the racks, I'm off to a PhD meeting at the AVU. I'll be back in the afternoon. Measuring the angles seemed so complicated at first that I preferred to cut them by hand. In the early evening I woke up, started measuring with the triangle, set up the miter gauge, and it finally started to come off. The Olga is like a greenhouse; the smell of sawdust mixes with sweat.

Friday 20. 6.
In the morning Lucia and I build the last few stands and then I spend the whole day cutting and assembling the spar. The top, sloping edge of the wall comes in, so the angle of the cut needs to be adjusted in both directions. I don't have the imagination for joints like this, and counting confuses me so much that I can barely bring the measurements I took a few seconds ago to the miter gauge in my head.

Sunday 22. 6.
Around lunchtime, we'll come for a couple of hours with Deni. To keep the noise down, I cut another spruce by hand while D. carries marks for the counter-grid of bamboo stalks. We're picked up by Rooster, who also works in construction (roofs, etc.) and it's hard to talk to him - like any other craftsman - about walls when they don't immediately become houses, or about work that doesn't turn into money. On the other hand, many a craftsman simply takes a saw and cuts wood. He doesn't care to think like a saw for a while and like wood for a while. Watching the monologues of the wall and the builder, I lose that directness.

Monday 23. 6.
I am finishing my spritzle, after lunch a visit to Tomas V. and in the evening Deni will help me again. This time she will prepare the straws and sand the holes left by the last show. I am growing nervous about the upcoming inspection day: what should happen during it? I'm used to being invited to finished things and suddenly I'm supposed to show the bones, outline the muscles, only mention the skin and leave the striding of the whole body wall to the imagination of others. Where will sharing the unknown lead me? I should add that none of the skeleton will be seen later. What is certain is that the inspection day will be neither a show of carpentry nor of any production.

Tuesday 24. 6.
Take a picture of the skeleton as soon as possible, because we want to use it for the print and the documents need to be sent by this afternoon. But then I'd have to have the sprue finished and the cable re-painted, which also needs to be attached to the ceiling! I get the shadow, fly around the gallery and don't get around to nailing the counter-sheet until after lunch. A lot of the straws I prepared yesterday are breaking, so I have to use others. I'll unroll another roll for that. Staple punch after staple punch makes me wonder if I can finish this build. I can't imagine plastering at all.

Wednesday 25. 6.
I'll finish the counter-grid in the morning, then clean up. We have an inspection day in the evening. It's hot, muggy and before we start, the sky is covered in smoke because there's a fire around the corner. Just enough of us gather to spread out in the skeleton of the building, while I talk about what else is going to happen in Olga. Actually, it's a promise: if I hadn't told the others my intention, I wouldn't have touched the skeleton. Not that the ornament of the structure is enough for me, it's just one of the construction phases, but the idea of the other ones makes me shudder. Fortunately for the wall, others seem to care how the thing turns out.

Monday 14. 7.
After a long pause forced by another masonry job, I return to the skeleton to start beating with bamboo mats. The procedure is clear, I don't have to think about anything and I unroll the mats from the centre of the spiral outwards. In the afternoon, Dita and I go to the radio station, where Dagmar M. and I talk about the wall on Teresa L.'s show.

Tuesday 15. 7.
After lunch, I push the compressor and keep on killing. Deni's gonna help me for a while this afternoon. I ask her to tighten the guide wires in the beaten mats, but she lacks patience and grumbles something about working for work. I'm not surprised, I vividly remember a similar mess in Jilska. I'd rather not remember. When I ask Deni before the end if she has finished her section, she replies that she doesn't understand me because she doesn't know where it should start and end.

Wednesday 16. 7.
In the morning Adam and I are going to Zbraslav and Hornbach to get fine clay, sololite, etc. Then I'll keep beating the skeleton with the mats. With the next load of material, the dimension of the whole building, which I have tried to ignore until now, comes upon me. Perhaps by not having a plan drawn, or areas accurately calculated. I don't even count the hours worked and I solve the building step by step - as if it had an open end. The opposite of a normal job, where there is a clear budget in front of me. I'm pleased to get a phone call from the brickworks in Stirboholy: there will be clay for the rough plaster.

Thursday 17. 7.
There was only a little bit left to complete the slaughter today, and yet it's only finished this afternoon. Then I'll start on the sololite backfill, and since the placement of the uprights doesn't come out to the width of the slab, I have to figure out how to cut them so there's as little waste as possible. The racks have run off due to the irregular curvature of the wall. In the evening before I leave I get a nice surprise visit, a full delegation of friendly architects.

Friday 18. 7.
At night I wake up all broken and I feel gloomy that I won't be able to pull myself together. I'm overwhelmed by the loneliness and mentally discuss the absurd background of this action: what do I have to spare that I have to waste so much energy on? However, dark reflections won't help anything, I'm going to Olga in the morning anyway. Tiredly I knock the remaining inner side and the wall takes on another dimension: no longer am I weaving through the structure, no longer am I peering through the fence, but I am finally facing the receding partition.

Monday 21. 7.
The stiff back did not loosen up over the weekend, quite the opposite. I'm only in Olga in the morning and it's enough for me. I'm carefully scraping the inner, sololite part of the partition with glue (the base layer under the clay) and organizing help for the next days. The construction is going to be the most voluminous movement of materials, which I definitely can't do alone. Despite all the fatigue and worry, however, curiosity prevails as to how the growing wall will turn out.

Tuesday 22. 7.
In the evening I read, "Watch every step when you go to God's house. Be more ready to hear than to sacrifice." I search to see what the implications of this are for the Lonely One - my back is fed up, the wall is writhing, and I don't want to exorcise the meaning of work with sacrifices. In the morning, Dita and I drive to Štěrbohol to get clay from the brickyard on a street with the telling name of Unfinished. For a hundred, I pour about 350kg of grey brick clay from a pile under a rusting conveyor. I spend the rest of the day squeegeeing the inside with bead glue.

Wednesday 23. 7.
In order to avoid further mixing during the day, I'm going to divide a whole calf of Picasso's fine clay plaster at once. It'll come on the inside of the wall. I want to coat the outside with Picasso's fine plaster as well, but lighter after the rough plastering. I made an enquiry yesterday and will be pleasantly surprised to receive it as a gift from the manufacturer, just for the cost of shipping. On the one hand a boost that someone trusts such experiments, on the other hand a responsibility to do the thing as well as possible. And that's exactly what I'm failing to do today: stretch the delicate inside of the partition and the strokes don't connect. Have I even decided what quality this surface should be? Stereotypically, I try to smooth the wall as much as possible, wasting time, and therefore the surface is not uniform. It's only after lunch that I start to get a feel for it. I don't even want to look at today's work, I couldn't tear myself away from it. It's better to turn out the lights than to keep going back to the flaws.

Thursday 24. 7.
In the morning the sand arrives and the driver backs the container over the stairs from the street to drop the cube right in front of Olga. I was unnecessarily nervous about the haul, the handling couldn't have been more elegant. In the morning Karel comes to help me, with whom we finish the remaining part of the fine plaster on the inside. Fortunately, the two of us are doing much better than yesterday, even though Karel has never done a similar job. I stretch, and when the material wavers, Karel tightens the plaster and smooths the joints with Japanese trowels. Perhaps because of the cooperation, or the large surface area, I don't worry about the perfect quality of the surface - the main thing is uniformity.

Friday 25. 7.
Again a collaboration, today the outside is being plastered with core mortar by the full Ruin assembly: Jan mixes, Ondřej carries and coarsely spreads the mortar on the bamboo mat, while I flatten the stretched surface and squeeze the perlinka into it. We head away from the entrance and manage half the wall. I'm worried after the first few feet because the mortar slides down the mat. However, once Jan adds more clay and mixes it thicker, the greasy mass holds and, cemented by the perlinka, springs back like skin backed by a thick layer of grout.

Saturday 26. 7.
Today, the Ruin Brigade is wrapping up its final episode. There is about a quarter of the sand left, which the boys are filling in, and I, barely reassured by the finished plaster, am already struggling with its removal. What burns me on this construction is not what is in my hands directly, but what is next door, within reach.

Sunday 27. 7.
I'd like to take a day off, but the drying mortar won't let me. The evaporated water has to leave the gallery, so I'm going to Olga to air out. Then I continue to go round the walls I plastered yesterday with a rounded trowel (the plaster will shrink on its own, but the stretched plaster needs to be squeezed) and cut a gap at the base of the wall - if the wall moves too much, don't let the bottom fall all the way down.

Monday 28. 7.
A freer day, when, in addition to ventilation, I cut off half the stands that overhang the sloping wall. The other half I just cut and leave alone until I do the final stucco layer on the outside. It's still hard to gauge the stability of the wall, and the shaking from stretching can tear the plaster.

Tuesday 29. 7.
The last shipment of material, namely fine light plaster from Picasso. From now on, the material should only be taken away. I have nothing else to do except clean up the sand, but I don't give up, I get out the sieve and pick at the remaining grey clay. It looks like dust swept from the road, and it irritates me more to smooth it out than the earthy clay. After a few hours of picking, however, I can feel every muscle. Something is creeping up on me.

Wednesday 30. 7.
I'm running a fever tonight, so I'm staying home for the night. The wall is standing.

Thursday 31. 7.
Brigade with Jan, we have a final fine plastering of the outside of the wall. Again we start from the dark centre of the spiral and again it takes me a while to figure out how to water the strokes and how to smooth the layer. As the light grows, I figure it out: I dampen the larger piece of stretched area with a sprayer, then chisel out the revived plaster with a stainless steel trowel, leaving Jan to make repairs, which he takes care of with smaller Japanese trowels. The result is smoother than the adjacent inner side, and with the difference in quality, I have a growing desire to finally stop distinguishing the sides from each other. For today, we'll wrap it up in the middle of the wall.

Friday 1. 8.
Yesterday's procedure with Jan is how we count what is left - except for a small part at the entrance to the spiral, which I will save for Monday. I'm relieved because the body of the wall is in a heap, and also because I've gotten over Wednesday's fatigue and didn't get cold. My back, on the other hand, will remember the Lonely One for a long time.

Monday 4. 8.
As soon as I finish the last bit of plaster, I go to cut off the protruding upright posts. With each loose stall, the wall jerks as if it's taken a step or gone into a counterpoint. But no cracks appear yet. Otherwise, I don't test its stability, no overstressing or groping. I'll leave her alone after cutting her off, and I'll clean her up tomorrow.

Tuesday 5. 8.
I'll wipe it down, whitewash a few dirty spots after plastering and harvest what I can. The thing has already taken on the format of an exhibition: without further ado, one can observe how the wall stands and how it has developed. I hesitate how eloquent it is on its own, and how valid other voices will be, be they the printed diary or the spoken words of the partition. Besides, I haven't written that one yet. I'm leaving tomorrow for two weeks, so when I finish the voices, they will be present in the exhibition for the last few days before the demolition. The line between construction, exhibition, and demolition has shrunk considerably for me.