Exhibition on Jaroslav Věšín at the National Museum of Military History

On 22 May (Thursday), the exhibition “A colourful Czech in Bulgaria” will be opened at 4 p.m. in the National Museum of Military History (NMMH) on 92 Cherkovna Str., Sofia, dedicated to the 165th anniversary of the birth and 110th anniversary of the death of Jaroslav Věšín.
The exhibition presents works by one of the masters of the brush. Czech by origin but Bulgarian at heart, he dedicated his life to Bulgaria and created some of the most gripping scenes in Bulgarian painting with а strong emotional impact and artistic mastery. In 1904, Jaroslav Věšín became the first chief artist to the Ministry of War, established himself as the founder of the military art genre in the country and had a profound impact on Bulgarian fine art and school of painting in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
The exhibition will present over 40 of his paintings, part of the collections of the National Museum of Military History, Sofia City Art Gallery and the Regional History Museum – Sofia. Among them are works in painting, graphics, watercolour, drawing ink, chalk and pencil, depicting domestic scenes, landscapes, the life of the Bulgarian army in peacetime and the testimony of what it experienced and suffered in the course of the Balkan Wars. Among the exhibited paintings are “Bayonet Charge”, “Army Supply Train Near the Ergene River”, “Base Depot”, “Military Field Hospital Near Dimotika”, “Charge at Ayvaz Baba (Fort)”, “Threshing”, “Prague”, “Horse Market in Poduene” and others.
An addition to the exhibition is an interactive application that will introduce visitors to Věšín’s life and work in detail, and will present digital images of his paintings, preserved in museums and galleries in the Czech Republic and Slovakia.

The exhibition is realised with participation from Sofia City Art Gallery and Regional History Museum – Sofia, and in partnership with galleries from the Czech Republic and Slovakia.