For the year-long series entitled STÁTKY, we are seeking creative teams to design and realize tailor-made programmes responding to Czech state and so-called “other” public holidays in 2026. The premises of the Club of Councillors, with their unique symbolic potential, will become the site for the presentation of ten artistic interventions, selected through an Open Call in cooperation with an expert committee.
Which Czech public holidays are we able to experience authentically in their current, dominant forms, as shaped and promoted by the state and its institutions? What role do memory and cultural institutions, schools, churches, the media, or even shopping centres play in them? What do we actually celebrate on days off work? That we don’t have to go to work? And what if we go anyway? What stories do we tell about ourselves on significant dates?
The series aims to reflect on the social significance of holidays and to open up space for their active, radical, and critical reinterpretation. It will offer the public the chance to experience a unique year of STÁTKY: hybrid events, mutated celebrations, and subversive provocations.
We are interested in holidays as performances of statehood and of national and civic identities. As rituals of memory and power. As stagings of values.
We are interested in ceremonies, customs, and traditions; in the mythology and religiosity of individual holidays, in the history of their establishment, and in international comparisons. We want to discuss where social consensus in 2026 is possible and where it is not. We are interested in how tradition becomes an institution, how art can intervene in this process, and for whom holidays exist—and for whom they do not.
We will engage with stories meant to confirm and shape state and national identity through a powerful tool: days off work. For many holidays, however, the history and agreement on their meaning today remain overshadowed by the need for rest from work and buried beneath layers of cultural, political, and market-driven meanings.
WHAT ARE WE LOOKING FOR?
Authorial projects—ideas, plans, and realizations of events that relate artistically to specific state holidays. We prefer concepts that offer live encounters in the spaces of the Club of Councillors.
We aim to develop conceptual thinking, personal narratives, activism, site-specific approaches, participation, community-based and engaged art, historical research, or experiences with the performativity of traditions. We are interested in concepts arising from the need to explore forms of collectivity and the kinds of loyalty demanded of us through holidays.
For each holiday—that is, for each part of the series—we will select one specific concept. We are looking for proposals for individual events, not for the entire series. It is possible to apply with multiple concepts for multiple holidays, but at most one project per applicant will be selected.
Part of the output will be a text of any genre published in a reader, capturing the relationship between the event and the holiday in the form of an explanation, commentary, essay, study, or authorial experiment.
The opening part of the series on 1 January 2026 (Day of the Restoration of the Independent Czech State and New Year’s Day) will be prepared by an internal creative team consisting of Matyáš Dlab, Anna Prstková, Libor Brzobohatý, and Kristýna Businská. The following nine projects will be selected through the Open Call.
We are looking for creative teams to design and realize programmes tailored to the following holidays:
Easter– Good Friday and Easter Monday
Event date: 29 March 2026 (Palm Sunday)
Labour Day
Event date: Friday, 1 May 2026
Victory Day
Event date: Friday, 8 May 2026
Day of the Slavic Apostles Cyril and Methodius
Event date: Sunday, 5 July 2026
Day of the Burning at the Stake of Jan Hus
Event date: Monday, 6 July 2026
Czech Statehood Day
Event date: Monday, 28 September 2026
Day of the Establishment of an Independent Czechoslovak State
Event date: Wednesday, 28 October 2026
Struggle for Freedom and Democracy Day
Event date: Tuesday, 17 November 2026
Christmas – Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, and St Stephen’s Day
Event date: 20 December 2026 (Fourth Sunday of Advent)
WHO ARE WE LOOKING FOR?
Individuals and collectives—from artistic to activist (and everything in between), theorists, experts of everyday life, and anyone who wants to critically examine with us the meaning, relevance, and lived practice of holidays. The Open Call is open to everyone regardless of nationality or citizenship, including non-Czech speakers. We especially invite collaboration from those who feel like outsiders in this country.
We are prepared to create a working environment that enables participation by people with specific needs related to reduced mobility.
WHAT DO WE OFFER?
Curatorial, production, and technical support in realizing an event related to a specific state holiday.
An author’s fee for an individual or collective in the total amount of CZK 15,000 and a production budget of CZK 20,000 for each event.
Accommodation and appropriate working facilities during the preparation process, based on mutual agreement.
Access to and use of the Club of Councillors, located within the Old Town Hall complex, a national cultural monument of the Czech Republic owned by the Statutory City of Brno. Terén, a stage of the Centre for Experimental Theatre, has been active here since 2025. This year, the series Collective Dreaming Club and the project Let the Orchard of Hope Bloom were presented here.
OPEN CALL
Call announced 28 September 2025 (Czech Statehood Day)
Deadline 17 November 2025 (Struggle for Freedom and Democracy Day)
Results announced 24 December 2025 (Christmas Eve)
🟠🟠To apply, please use the application form.🟠🟠
The Open Call will be evaluated in cooperation with an expert committee consisting of Milena Bartlová, Marika Kupková, and Vojtěch Novák.
CONSULTATIONS
We offer consultations with the production team in the form of a group video call on the following dates:
9 October 2025 (World Post Day)
28 October 2025 (Day of the Establishment of an Independent Czechoslovak State)
11 November 2025 (Veterans Day)
Please register for consultations in advance via the consultation form.
If needed, you can also contact us at teren@ced-brno.cz
When evaluating submitted concepts, we will consider the ability to plan the scope of the project in accordance with the production budget and fee levels.
Upon request, the production team will provide brief feedback in the case of non-selection.
All Open Call information can be found clearly in one place here:
🟠STÁTKY - Open Call
🟠STÁTKY - Additional Information