19.05.2025
Photographs from the Second World War, as well as from other war conflicts, are presented at the new photographic exhibition of the ČTK entitled The War Moments. The national news agency prepared it to mark the 80th anniversary of the end of World War II. The touring outdoor exhibition has been on display in the Wallenstein Garden of the Senate since this week. Its Speaker Miloš Vystrčil opened the exhibition today as part of the Open Day of the Upper House of Parliament.
The main part of the exhibition features photos from the Second World War. It also presents a selection of photographs from other conflicts spanning the past 80 years, some of which are often described as ground-breaking or iconic in terms of the history of reportage photography. The exhibition shows how photojournalists mapped not only the battle sites, but also civilian life and other events associated with the war. It also reminds how some pictures became part of propaganda. Besides, there are photographs that have won international or domestic awards.
"We selected almost 140 photographs for the exhibition. They come not only from the ČTK’s production of that time, but also from a large number of foreign sources that are represented by the joint ČTK/Profimedia photo bank. In addition to photographs from foreign agencies, these are also some from the archives of various institutions," said ČTK Photo Bank editor-in-chief Petr Mlch, a co-author of the exhibition. Some photographs were loaned by the Czech Photo company, which organises the Czech Press Photo competition.
The exhibition will take place in the Wallenstein Garden until May 29, while its parallel display can also be seen in the Central Park in Prague's Pankrác neighbourhood until the end of May. Its premiere outside Prague will be held at the Summer Film School festival in Uherské Hradiště at the end of July and the beginning of August, and in the autumn, it will go to Šumperk and Brno.
Part of the exhibition are also several podcasts on the phenomenon of war photography, created by journalism students of the Faculty of Social Sciences of Charles University (FSV UK) within the framework of the agency journalism course at the ČTK Academy. Workbooks for schools are also available. "As with the previous ČTK touring exhibitions, this year's one is our contribution to supplementing the teaching of social sciences. We have had very nice feedback from schools in the towns that have hosted our exhibitions," said ČTK news desk editor-in-chief Radka Matesová Marková, who is a co-author of the exhibition.
The ČTK has been organising touring outdoor photographic exhibitions since 2018, when it prepared the display Moments of the Century on the occasion of the centenary of the foundation of Czechoslovakia and the ČTK. It was also premiered in the Wallenstein Garden. In the following years, the ČTK prepared the exhibitions Moments of the Velvet Revolution, Undesired Moments, Olympic Moments, Czecho/Slovak Moments and Presidential Moments. The most recent was the 100kamžiků (100Moments) exhibition last year, in which the ČTK mapped a century of its own photographic production.