An exhibition about overcoming boundaries and seeking new forms of coexistence in difficult situations. 

Even today, freedom is not a natural state. There are still people around us who, for a variety of reasons, are in isolation. Behind walls. The exhibition When the Walls Come Down shows what happens when art enters places such as prisons, refugee camps, or socially excluded neighborhoods—not as therapy or a guide to rehabilitation, but as an encounter between equals. These places carry different stories, but they are united by similar experiences. The exhibiting artists, who have long collaborated with people who have lived through these experiences, present joint projects in which the “isolated” person becomes a co-creator.  

Using examples from the Czech Republic dating from the 1990s to the present, the exhibition traces how attitudes toward isolation and exclusion have changed—from repression to the restoration of trust, from segregation to coexistence. You’ll see videos, paintings, and other works created in direct collaboration with people whose freedom of movement or decision-making is restricted.

The exhibition does not provide answers on how to solve social exclusion. However, it asks what will happen when the wall—both literal and figurative—finally comes down. And it shows that the answer already exists in some places. The data and factual information used in the installation come from professional and expert organizations that focus on similar topics.