"What me have experienced as regards figurative small-scale sculpture in the time period between 1945 and 1989 can be described as a kind of state of emergency caused by politics and ideology. Europe has been divided into not only free and independent Western Europe and socialist dictatorships from Eastern Europe but also into various principles of art, with abstraction being prevalent in the West and figuration in the East, due to which the image of man has in small-scale sculpture of the West played a marginal role , thus human figure, inasmuch it has been a point of departure for sculptural creativeness, has been decomposed and transformed in an abstract way, if one ignores exceptions as Moore, Picasso, Miró and Giacometti who have been bound to the pre-war avantgarde. On the other hand, however, the Eastern European sculptural creativeness has, more or less, been subject to a strict dictate on the part of socialist realism which has taken full swing in monumental large-sized sculpture, not so much in small-scale sculpture. At a closer look one finds, in this time period of Eastern European small-scale sculpture, not only politically correct and conservative attitudes but also a very differentiated spectrum of options of expression. Mutual communication got to be more and more difficult for the Western eyes which had lost sight of figurative nuances and the Eastern eyes had lost sight of the formally abstract in that lurking behind all these stylistic questions were various outlooks on life as well as experiences.

Whith one punch, in the years from 1989 through 1990, political ideologies have been disintegrated, along with contracts between abstraction and figuration. More and more examples of figuratively shaped human figures cropped up in small-scale sculpture of the West whereas in the East abstract trends have won recognition and in both parts of Europe the question of abstraction and figuration of human figure in small-scale sculpture could be redefined. The diversion and the change in direction proved to be very attractive for the grooving young generation of both parts of Europe. Due to discontinued ideologies, awareness all across Europe underwent a change and along with it the way of thinking and comprehending has also changed, not only as regards the already produced works-of-art but also as regards the newly created ones. In light of artistic as well as cognitive changes the concept of a new image of man in European small scale sculpture turned out to be more and more appealing. Is it possible event at this day and age to detect contrasts between the East and the West along with individual, regional and national ones? What is the role that different organizations play in this respect? Presentation of original works at this exhibition in to clarify the issue in that the exchange of notions among the artists, the curators and the public can give a contribution as regards further insight. Long since, however, one could guess, that, like in 1945, the times of innovative aspirations of the West and the restorative utopias of the East have become passé, along with the times of the common European avantgarde movements with their utopian concepts of life. The broadening of the definition of a sculpture, which has been in force since the Sixties, the accessibility to information and communication have brought together the sculptors sculptresses of the entire Europe. Between the unburdened and unlimited possibilities and unpredictable options they have to try even harder to find their own self and their own attitude towards the image of man.

EU-phoria – an exhibition where noted creative artists from five new European Union countries met together to display their cultural roots and to advance their individual visions. Representation. Their own, that of their community, of their historical experiences and, at the same time, their future representation.

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Artists from Slovenia, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Estonia and Hungary met virtually at this exhibition, carrying along individual ideas. As Faces, they stood opposite one other, and tones of debate, critique, discourse began to ring in their works.

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If we look at the works in the present exhibition, we see our own faces mirrored in them, and those of others. Superb creations and artists who have deemed it important to appear together, one beside the other, with their openness, include the public in the playground as well: comprehension is never ending; it spurs one to constant rebirth, rejuvenating the continuity of generations at the brink of the abyss and at the turning point. Without emptiness and emptying.