[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 153 (2007), Part 12]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page 16750]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                 WELCOMING OLDRICH KULHANEK TO CHICAGO

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                           HON. RAHM EMANUEL

                              of illinois

                    in the house of representatives

                        Wednesday, June 20, 2007

  Mr. EMANUEL. Madam Speaker, I rise today to welcome the world-
renowned artist, Oldrich Kulhanek, to my home city of Chicago to 
exhibit his drawings and prints.
  Mr. Kulhanek's work is displayed in Chicago's Art Institute, the 
Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris, Prague's National Gallery and in more 
than twenty other of the world's most prestigious museums.
  Mr. Kulhanek's dedication to his work came at a high personal cost. 
His conviction that ``the artist should reveal the pretence (or lies) 
of the establishment, unmasking what is happening to man a showing how 
man is manipulated and dehumanized'' led to his arrest in 1971 by the 
Czechoslovak Secret Police. He was accused of ``disgracing the 
representatives of communist countries,'' with depictions of Josef 
Stalin in many of the prints he created from 1968 through 1971--an 
offense that led to a charge of sedition.
  Mr. Kulhanek spent a month in jail on this charge, and he was 
interrogated every 14 days for 2 years afterward. Although the laws 
under which he was charged were revoked by the president, his work was 
not immune from the government's hand.
  In a scene the artist has described as ``Kafkaesque,'' eleven of his 
prints stood trial in a Prague Local Court and were sentenced to 
destruction. He was forbidden to show his work or to collaborate with 
publishers. Despite this artistic exile he continued to create. Many of 
his pieces were shown illegally under a pseudonym or smuggled to 
European countries for exhibition.
  But today the Czech Republic celebrates Oldrich Kulhanek. He was 
commissioned to design the new Czech Banknotes, and was one of the 
principal designers of new Czech stamps, including one depicting 
President Vaclav Klaus.
  Madam Speaker, I am honored to welcome Oldrich Kulhanek to Chicago 
and I thank him for his fine work and commitment to art and freedom of 
expression.

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