Commemorating Václav Havel’s 80th birthday
Today would mark the 80th birthday of Václav Havel, the last president of Czechoslovakia and the first president of the Czech Republic. A playwright and political activist, Havel was the leading figure in the movement that led to the fall of Communism.
To commemorate his life and work, Google Arts & Culture has partnered with the Václav Havel Library to present Tribute to Václav Havel, an online exhibition of photographs. This, along with three other existing digital collections, gives anyone the opportunity to learn more about this famous dissident, dramatist and freedom fighter.
- Tribute to Václav Havel features Oldřich Škácha’s photographs of Havel, his friends and his milieu.
- Václav Havel 1975 - 2011, a collection of photographs by Ondřej Němec, shows Havel talking with friends, attending informal events and meeting Bill Clinton, Madeleine Albright, Prince Charles or the Rolling Stones.
- Leaving is a multimedia exhibition of documents and photographs from Václav Havel’s last play and first film.
- Pavel Hroch’s photographs in With a Passion for Freedom connect viewers to the charged atmosphere surrounding 1989’s Velvet Revolution and the subsequent transformation of Czech society.
And for anyone visiting Prague, many of Škácha’s photographs are on display in an open-air exhibition in Prague's Dejvice quarter from October 5 to December 18.
We’re proud to be able to collaborate with the Václav Havel Library on this important project, helping to ensure that the world remembers Havel’s tireless dedication to the fight for human rights.
