Viera Kleinová
The subtle, irregularly built up collection of wood in the Slovak National Gallery is founded on three figures. It is marked by the works of Václav Kautman (1922 – 1981), Viktor Holešťák-Holubár (1926 – 1989) and Stanislav Koreň (1935), whose work was introduced to the National Gallery at the beginning of the 1960s by the initiator and first curator of the collections of applied art and design Igor Didov (1930 – 2002). They represented the new, reconstructed face of Slovak applied art and design, brought into the gallery world mainly as unique and limited editions, just as in other fields (ceramics, textile, glass, metal). In the world of wood, Kautman, Koreň and Holešťák-Holubár were almost the only progressive and long-term functioning authorities identified through their work in the Centre for Folk Art Production (ÚĽUV), the Centre for Art Crafts (ÚUR) and the applied art section of the Association of Slovak Fine Artists (ZSVU).