Jay Gard, Jan Tichy – Ornament als Versprechen
KORNFELD Galerie Berlin is delighted to unveil Jan Tichy and Jay Gard’s first joint exhibition, Ornament als Versprechen. Jan Tichy’s delicate small-format cyanotypes meet Jay Gard’s sculptures and paintings, forming a visual tapestry that reflects a shared artistic journey. Together, the artists celebrate the allure of ornament, transforming it into a poetic symphony of form and texture.
The exhibition title Ornament als Versprechen (“Ornament as Promise”) derives from Adolf Loos’s seminal essay Ornament and Crime. Loos famously dismissed ornament as decadent and unnecessary, advocating instead for the primacy of the pure object. Tichy and Gard reinterpret this philosophy by making ornament itself the pure object—stripped of superfluous decoration and elevated to a substantial, meaningful motif.
Jan Tichy presents a compelling series of cyanotypes developed through a Perecian approach to mapping the city of Paris during the first weeks of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. By documenting architectural elements such as fences, railings, gates, and grids around Rue des Archives, he explores the boundaries and protective mechanisms that define urban space. His works guide viewers through the distinctive “building blocks” of Paris’s districts, revealing how cities are structured and defended.
Jay Gard draws inspiration from traditional art objects, particularly from overlooked details such as the frames of Old Master paintings. By isolating and recontextualising these frames, Gard highlights their artistic qualities—normally overshadowed by the paintings they surround. His works function as both a homage to art history and a call to shift attention toward marginalised elements within artistic discourse.
Together, Tichy and Gard transform ornament from decorative detail into a contemporary, didactic tool. Their works engage with the formal language of the Bauhaus while simultaneously celebrating ornament—an apparent paradox rooted in both artists’ personal histories, as each lived and worked as a resident artist in one of the Bauhaus Master Houses. The result is a distinctive creative synthesis that challenges Bauhaus principles while affirming the enduring beauty of ornament.
Jan Tichy (born 1974, Prague, Czech Republic) is an Associate Professor at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. His work has been shown in major international exhibitions and biennials, including solo exhibitions at MCA Chicago, Tel Aviv Museum of Art, CCA Tel Aviv, the Santa Barbara Museum of Art, and the Chicago Cultural Center. His works are held in public collections such as the Museum of Modern Art (New York) and the Israel Museum (Jerusalem). In May 2024, the exhibition Lucia Moholy: Exposures, co-curated by Tichy, opens at Kunsthalle Praha, presenting the first comprehensive account of the Prague-born writer and photographer Lucia Moholy (1894–1989), including photographs and video installations by Tichy addressing absences in Moholy’s oeuvre.
Jay Gard (born 1984, Halle/Saale, Germany) lives and works in Berlin and has been Co-Curator of the BcmA Gallery since 2022. His work has been presented in numerous solo and group exhibitions and has received several grants and awards. As part of the European Capital of Culture 2025 Chemnitz, Gard’s artistic concept for a public-space artwork was selected for realisation.
