The second round of the Ora et lege (Pray and Read) project at the Broumov Monastery will present the work of the Benedictine monk and prominent British neo-avant-garde artist, Dom Sylvester Houédard (1924–1992). Also known as “dsh” or “dom”, he was widely recognized during his lifetime as one of the leading theorists and important representatives of concrete poetry. His solo exhibition entitled endlessly inside is his first in the Czech Republic and one of the projects bringing his unjustly forgotten work back into cultural awareness. The exhibition will include a series of performances by other leading artists associated with concrete poetry as it is reflected today.

Houédard is a unique figure in the history of modern art, with a life and cultural background that is difficult to grasp, straddling the divide between London’s counterculture and the enclosure of the Benedictine monastery at Prinknash Abbey in Gloucestershire. He was a concrete poetry pioneer in the UK, and during his lifetime he was recognized as a leading theorist and major representative of the movement of experimental poetry at the intersection of visual art and literature. This developed simultaneously in many parts of the world from the 1950s onwards, and its golden age ended during the 1970s.

The solo exhibition endlessly inside features approximately 60 works in three sections, representing Houédard’s interests in theology, Eastern religion (especially Tantric Buddhism), avant-garde art and socio-political events of the time. The opening section focuses on abstract typograms called Typestracts (combining the words “typewriter” and “abstract”) – works created on an Olivetti 22 typewriter using blue, red, or black ink ribbons. The following section presents Laminate Poems and Cosmic Dust Poems, which Houédard started to create in about 1966. This series of poetic objects consists of small found objects of either natural or man-made materials sealed in transparent, often colored plastic film. The last section of the exhibition, situated in the library of the Broumov Monastery, is devoted to Houédard’s books and his activities with the publishing house Openings Press, which he co-founded together with John Furnival and Edward Wright in 1964 and where he was active until the late 1960s. Openings Press published a number of poems by acclaimed authors of concrete and visual poetry and their collaborators included the Czech artist Jiří Valoch, whose work for Openings Press is featured in this exhibition.

The works on display are on loan from the following London galleries: the Lisson Gallery, the Richard Saltoun Gallery and William Allen Word & Image.

The exhibition takes place on the premises of the historically unique Benedictine Monastery in Broumov, in both the monastic library and the refectory. The catalogue features texts by Monika Čejková, Nicola Simpson and Jonathan P. Watts.