Veronika Drahotová – Another Rainbow
Another Rainbow: temporary painting in public space in Mladá Boleslav
On Sunday 31. On 31 May 2026, the parking lot of the Škoda Auto complex in Mladá Boleslav (Ptácká 1453, opposite the Graal restaurant) will host the realization of a site-specific installation Another Rainbow by multimedia artist Veronika Drahotová. The 150m-long project is supported by the Škoda Auto Foundation's Visual Arts Programme in collaboration with the Foundation for Contemporary Art Prague and presents contemporary art in public space in its open, processual and environmentally sensitive form.
Another Rainbow takes the traditional rainbow motif from the sky to the ground and rethinks it as an image of hope, which is not created from above, but through human action. The installation works with the idea of another beginning - an expectation growing out of a particular place, a broken landscape or urban space. Here, the rainbow is not a fleeting optical phenomenon, but a material trace that emerges, transforms and gradually disappears.
The realisation will take place on Sunday 31 May, when four basic colour pigments will be applied to the surface of the car park. These mineral pigments, which form the elementary building blocks of the painting, are poured onto the surface as layers of colour that then naturally mix and change. This process is the key principle of the project: the resulting image is not static, but is created and evolves over time. External influences - the movement of cars, rain, wind and light - actively enter into its form, disrupting, shifting and combining the pigments into new shapes and shades. On weekdays the rainbow disappears under parked cars, on weekends it is visible in its entirety. The surrounding environment thus becomes a co-author of the installation.
The artist sees the parking lot as a large-scale painting surface that allows her to work with a scale that goes beyond the usual gallery framework. Due to the location of the site, the installation can also be viewed from an elevated point opposite (Krajířova Street), from where a view of the whole opens up as a temporary scene in which a changing image is unfolding in real time.
The pigments used are natural, environmentally friendly and health friendly. The installation is designed to be temporary and reversible - gradually dissolving and disappearing due to natural conditions. This aspect is not a side effect but an integral part of the concept:A Different Rainbow emphasizes transience as a value and opens up questions about the relationship between creation and its demise, between humans and the environment they co-create.
The project builds on the artist's earlier installations in public space, such as Airlocks (1998) and Prizmatoid (1999), which featured light as a medium of illusion, transformation and contemplation. In the current realization, these principles move from the optical plane to the physical space, where color becomes a material subject to time and environmental conditions.
Veronika Drahotová is a multimedia artist, curator, and educator. In her work, among other things, she has long focused on the relationship between painting, space and material, often with an emphasis on the processuality, layering and mutability of the image. She works across media - from classical painting to object performance to site-specific installations in public space. Her work has been presented in the Czech Republic and abroad and reflects an interest in contemporary forms of visual thinking with philosophical and environmental overtones.
The performance will be open to the public on Sunday 31 May at 3pm, with the opening ceremony taking place at 6pm. The installation will remain in place until its natural demise.
