Year after year, talent admission exams are held at the Academy of Fine Arts in Prague to determine who among the many applicants will earn a coveted spot at the 220-year-old institution. By extension, those chosen will set the tone in the fine arts world for years to come. Professors from each of the school’s subdisciplines interrogate the nervous young applicants, who in turn must not only present their work but also answer for their own artistic beliefs and practice. Equally exhausted by this process, the instructors are confronted by their own set of questions: how can and should artistic talent be assessed? What role do institutions such as the Academy play in the 21st century? What does the next generation of great artists look like? 

In the vein of Frederick Wiseman’s work, ART TALENT SHOW offers insightful commentary on the intergenerational cultural dissonance surrounding topics like identity politics and social justice in relation to art and its practice. A “documentary less about art or talent than about the Sisyphean task of assessing one and nurturing the other” (Variety), filmmakers Adéla Komrzý and Tomáš Bojar take a sensitive and ultimately light-hearted approach to the examination of art school admission.

“Provocative but also hilarious, both a sendup and a tribute to the complexity of contemporary art... spotlights complex attitudes about the relationship between identity, craft and art, even in highly progressive contexts — and how fun they are to watch while they do it.” –The New York Times

DIRECTED BY ADÉLA KOMRZÝ & TOMÁŠ BOJAR
CZECH REPUBLIC | 2022 | CZECH WITH ENGLISH SUBTITLES