ARS/QUANTA – Art of Measurement

The exhibition "ARS/QUANTA – The Art of Measurement" presents remarkable historical measuring instruments, devices and metrological aids from the collection of Jiří Novák and Robert Pelant, samples from ancient scientific books and contemporary Czech and Slovak art on the theme of measuring "everything possible and impossible".

 The ARS/QUANTA exhibition was created as a reaction to the accidental discovery of a collection of period instruments, devices and aids from the field of physical and physical-mechanical metrology. Jiří Novák and Robert Pelant came across it by chance in a block of flats in Motola and were so captivated by the beauty of the measuring devices that they spontaneously decided to save the collection, which was threatened with liquidation. The collection shrouded in mystery became the core of the exhibition, confronting the utilitarian design of metrological instruments with the works of contemporary artists and also with samples of books from the NTK Historical Fund.

A significant part of the exhibition is made up of the works of fourteen contemporary Czech and Slovak artists whose themes are in the field of metrology and measurement in the broadest sense. The artists represented represent a variety of approaches to the chosen subject, we can find mainly works of a conceptual nature (e.g. Vladimír Havlík, Otis Laubert, Jirka Skála, Markéta Magidová or Martin Zet), but there are also primarily "retinal" works, such as spatial assemblages of sculptor Michal Machciník or the paintings of Aleš Zapletal.  Some of the artists use measurement issues to criticize social ills and problems (Epos 257, Vladimír Turner).

Please do not expect expert insight into the field of metrology from our presentation. We do not want the exhibition to replace the metrological exhibition of the National Technical Museum, and the displayed collection of measuring devices should be seen more as a radical exhibition gesture, a kind of ready-made. The ARS/QUANTA exhibition is a poetic meditation, but also a critical reflection on the phenomenon of measurement and its meaning in contemporary society and its reflection in contemporary art. 

We can perceive measurement as a metaphor for an exact, scientific approach to the world, at the same time we encounter it in everyday banal practice. Measurement co-creates our world. Without measurement, there would be no civilization as we know it.

ARS/QUANTA is an inexact exhibition about an exact phenomenon.