• City Gallery of Contemporary Art

PLATO

csen

About

Where to find us

PLATO is a municipal contemporary art gallery in Ostrava. We operate in the city centre in two locations less than 70 m apart. Our main exhibitions can be found in the PLATO building, a reconstructed, heritage-listed municipal slaughterhouse from the late 19th century. We use the other space, PLATO Bauhaus, a former hobby market with nearly 5,000 m2 of space, for educational and community programmes.

To understand the world

We offer space to everyone who wants to understand the present-day world in a broader context. In PLATO, we reflect on the world’s complexity and richness through art, in an international context and at the highest possible level. We trust artists and support them.

Broader context

Besides exhibitions, you can come and enjoy programmes for families and a wide range of educational activities. We curate our own concert and film series and run the Octopus Press publishing house. We place special emphasis on issues of feminism, ecology, and social justice.

Library or lettuce

You will find cafés in both of our buildings. In PLATO, the former slaughterhouse, we also run a hydroponic farm where you can buy fresh lettuce—we have turned animal “production” into plant production! In PLATO Bauhaus we have a freely accessible library with a reading room, a material library, a bookshop, a garden, and a cinema.

Are you looking for a space?

We create a practical background for all kinds of artistic and non-artistic communities and collaborate with them. We offer the former Bauhaus Hobby Market to organisers of cultural and other events, thus supporting the local scene.

ostrava_logo

PLATO Ostrava is a city-funded organisation of the City of Ostrava.

 

We are a city gallery bringing our visitors an opportunity to experience intense encounters with contemporary visual arts. Contemporary art is not just something in which one can find pleasure, but rather a particular creative approach to the world. It may result in objects immediately recognisable as works of art, but also in situations or events in time and space, through which artists explore the present and invite viewers to be active and think for themselves.

We are convinced that the gallery should do justice to the nature of contemporary art and meet the needs of artists, curators and other creators. Not the other way around. In fact, a gallery that clings to tried-and-tested and obligatory formats and practices isn’t working properly – not only in relation to art and artists, but above all in relation to the public. Contemporary art sees and shows the world from perspectives that are seemingly not a normal part of our everyday actions. And that’s where its value is to be found.

The contemporary art gallery helps artists realize their visions. At the same time, though, it creates a background for visitors that enables them to recognise and intensely experience ideas about the world and suggestions on how to perceive it, what to do in it and with it, expressed through artistic creation. To understand this, we also offer glimpses into other disciplines that set it in a broader context. In this way, we ourselves keep learning – from the artists, and also from our visitors and collaborators. And education is something that we consider to be an equal and integral part of our activities and identity.

We believe in contemporary art that is continuously developing and whose forms, functions and intentions are constantly changing, just like the world itself. The initial values of modern art – the openness to the new, the criticism of social injustice and a belief in people as free, sensitive and thoughtful beings – continue in contemporary art in a way that corresponds to the 21st century experience and takes on unique forms in various places around the world, including Ostrava.

Our task is to work with contemporary art in order to convey to the people of Ostrava and its immediate surroundings diverse ways of understanding and experiencing the present on the one hand, and on the other the inspiring alternatives for the future, which are being explored by artists from all over the world. With their help, we develop an awareness of an increasingly complex world and different ways of understanding, depicting and considering its risks and challenges. We do it for the benefit of the inhabitants of this unique city – and beyond – as we share responsibility for its condition.

Our new venue, the renovated municipal slaughterhouse, in a way represents a solid, supporting point for our activities, which makes it possible for our programme to preserve a certain conscious degree of volatility and improvisation. We therefore intend to use the next few years to explore, among other things, the various possibilities offered by the new venue and its immediate surroundings.

Marek Pokorný
Director of PLATO

April 2022

Director
Marek Pokorný
marek.pokorny@plato-ostrava.cz

Deputy director, Communication
Dita Eibenová
+420 739 678 915
dita.eibenova@plato-ostrava.cz

Operation director
Magda Luňáčková
+420 602 201 857
magda.lunackova@plato-ostrava.cz

Assistant to the director, Economic administration officer

Aneta Skulinová
+420 739 679 429
aneta.skulinova@plato-ostrava.cz

Curator
Edith Jeřábková
+420 736 699 600
edith.jerabkova@plato-ostrava.cz

Curator and programming
Jakub Adamec
+420 739 675 582
jakub.adamec@plato-ostrava.cz

Curators
Daniela and Linda Dostálková

Project manager
Pavlína Spurná
+420 721 318 254
pavlina.spurna@plato-ostrava.cz

Promotion and graphic output manager
Michaela Ondroušková
+420 737 834 512
michaela.ondrouskova@plato-ostrava.cz

Coordination of the program of partners in PLATO Bauhaus
Lívie Škutová
+420 737 856 981
livie.skutova@plato-ostrava.cz

Gallery educators

Alice Sovadinová, head
+420 737 855 798
alice.sovadinova@plato-ostrava.cz

Kristýna Koblasová
+420 727 952 712
kristyna.koblasova@plato-ostrava.cz

Jiří Gruber
+420 608 002 666
jiri.gruber@plato-ostrava.cz

Iveta Horáková
+420 737 855 798
iveta.horakova@plato-ostrava.cz

Production

Tereza Měsícová
+420 720 955 726
tereza.mesicova@plato-ostrava.cz

Lenka Škutová
+420 702 121 101
lenka.skutova@plato-ostrava.cz

Lucia Devečková
+420 705 939 976
lucia.deveckova@plato-ostrava.cz

Operation


Visitor service
Anna Pohořálková, head
+420 702 206 099
info@plato-ostrava.cz

Facility manager
Radim Tomašovský
+420 737 859 781
radim.tomasovsky@plato-ostrava.cz

Technician
Michal Janošec
+420 739 279 185
michal.janosec@plato-ostrava.cz

Technician / Facility manager
Lubomír Kovářík
+420 739 853 769
lubomir.kovarik@plato-ostrava.cz

Economist
Pavlína Hrotíková
+420 724 881 583
pavlina.hrotikova@plato-ostrava.cz

Accountant
Iva Studená
+420 605 287 326
iva.studena@plato-ostrava.cz

Visual identity of PLATO, Octopus Press and website
Radim Peško & Tomáš Celizna

PLATO (former slaughterhouse):

In 2022, the renovated heritage site of the municipal slaughterhouse in the centre of Ostrava has become the permanent seat of PLATO. The exhibition space spanning over five halls covers an area of 1,370 m². The author of the reconstruction, architect Robert Konieczny and his studio KWK Promes, offered a solution that makes it possible to rotate six walls and open the building from all sides. The interior also features a hydroponic lettuce farm in the café area, emphasising the importance of ecology and local (plant) production. The interior was designed by architect Yvette Vašourková. The slaughterhouse building served its original purpose from 1881 to 1965; abandoned in the 1970s, it kept dilapidating and was declared a cultural monument in 1987.

Architectural design of the slaughterhouse conversion: Robert Konieczny and KWK Promes Studio
Interior design: Yvetta Vašourková
Investor: City of Ostrava
Total usable area: 2,840 m²
Exhibition area: 1,370 m²
Café: 250 m²
Storage area and depository: 70 m²
Total area of the gallery and the lot: 11,100 m²
Conversion of slaughterhouse to gallery finished in: 2022

Public space surrounding PLATO:

The openness of the institution and the building will also be reflected in the green space of almost 9,000 m², designed for PLATO by permaculture designer Denisa Tomášková, which is being built on the site. The result will be a garden and park founded in autumn 2022. In the years to come, caring for the green spaces and developing them further will become an important theme for PLATO.

Investor: City of Ostrava
Authors: Robert Konieczny and KWK Promes Studio, MS-projekce s.r.o.
Vegetation adjustments: Denisa Tomášková
Cooperation: PLATO and Městský ateliér prostorového plánování a architektury (MAPPA)
Paved areas surrounding the building: 8,976 m²
Park and garden founded in: 2022

PLATO Bauhaus: Since 2018, PLATO has had an area of almost 5,000 m² available for its activities in the former Bauhaus hobby market in the centre of Ostrava. The generous open space of the hall houses a library with a reading room, a café with an adjoining roofed garden and a cinema that serves as a relaxation zone during the day. We have also built a large stage for concerts and theatre shows and a bookstore. These parts of the gallery, including the reception area, facilities for educational programmes and changing rooms, were built by PLATO over a period of one year with artists from all over the world. We offer functional zones and artworks in one place. Interior elements referring to the former function of the building, such as signs and wall paint, have been intentionally left in place.

Exhibition area: 5,400 m²
Total usable area: 6,160 m²
Total area of the gallery and the lot: 7,500 m²

PLATO + PLATO Bauhaus

Total area: 18,600 m²

PLATO, a city-funded organisation of the City of Ostrava, was established in 2016 as a successor to a grant project (2013–2016), which used the gallery of the Gong Hall in Dolní Vítkovice and the premises of Trojhalí Karolina. After a year of activity as Office for the Arts in a small temporary space on Českobratrská Street (2017), we moved to the former hobby market (2018), to which the renovated abattoir building was added in 2022 as the gallery's headquarters.

PLATO (slaughterhouse building):

The premises of the new PLATO will be rented in exceptional cases only.

PLATO Bauhaus:

Whether you are planning a small party or a big event, you have the option to rent the entire PLATO Bauhaus gallery hall, or just the reading room in the library, the cinema room with its own sound system, the stage (theatre space/stage) and the roofed garden. The PLATO Café with kitchen, which can provide tailor-made catering, can also be rented.

  • We offer both staff services (visitor services, production, technicians, lecturers from the education department, etc.) and technical support (sound equipment, microphones, data projectors, LCD screens, basic lighting equipment and furnishings). The entire gallery is covered with Wi-Fi.
  • We will be happy to send you a price quote upon specification of your requirements. Discounts are offered to non-profit organizations.
  • If interested, please contact us at info@plato-ostrava.cz.

PLATO Ostrava
city-funded institution
Porážková 3395/26
702 00 Ostrava CZ
ID NO: 71294538
Data mailbox ID: c953qqh
posta@plato-ostrava.cz

Bank account: 115-2926620237/0100
Transparent bank account for donations: 123-0032140227/0100

 

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Photo: Matěj Doležel, PLATO
Photo: Martin Straka
Photo: Dominika Goralska, PLATO
Photo: Martin Popelář, PLATO
Photo: Jan Antoš, PLATO
Photo: Matěj Doležel, PLATO
Photo: Jan Antoš, PLATO
Photo: Dominika Goralska, PLATO
Photo: Dominika Goralska, PLATO
photo: Matěj Doležel
photo: Matěj Doležel
photo: Matěj Doležel
photo: Zuzana Šrámková
photo: Matěj Doležel
photo: Zuzana Šrámková
photo: Magdaléna Dušková
photo: Magdaléna Dušková
photo: Zuzana Šrámková
Photo: Matěj Doležel, PLATO
photo: Karolína Matušková
photo: Jakub Frank

Archive
PLATO Ostrava website 01/2014–01/2018
Preserved by Webarchiv of National Library of the Czech Republic.

Contact details of the data protection officer:
Moore Advisory CZ s.r.o., seated at Karolínská 661/4, Karlín, 186 00 Praha 8; represented by jednatel Ing. Radovan Hauk. Contact person Petr Štětka, tel. 734 647 701, e-mail: gdpr@moore-czech.cz.