My city

Since 2008, I have been wandering the streets of Frýdek-Místek and its surroundings, documenting the traces of our times. The decline of the textile industry, the controversial demolition of significant buildings, but also the ordinary rhythms of everyday life.

My Frýdek-Místek is a dark place. A city that was artificially expanded during the industrial boom of steelmaking and coal mining. People moved here in search of work, with little connection to the landscape, their roots, or the values of the place.

My father comes from Hanušovice, my mother from Lysice, and I was born in Boskovice. We moved to Frýdek-Místek because of the newly established Research Institute of Metallurgy and Iron in nearby Dobrá, where my father took up a position as a research scientist after graduating from university.

In a sense, my own roots lie elsewhere too, among the hills of the Jeseníky Mountains and the Bohemian-Moravian Highlands. Working on this photographic series has become a form of therapy, a way of coming to terms with the futile search for those roots in a city where I have spent almost my entire life.