On October 1st, 2024 at 16.00, the exhibition of reproductions of engravings by the famous Czech polar explorer Julius Payer will open at the auditorium 223 of the House of Nature, University of Latvia, Jelgavas iela 1, with a lecture about Julius Payer and his expeditions to the North Pole by diplomat, translator and traveller Zdeněk Lyčka.
“The North Pole Expedition” is an exhibition of book illustrations by Julius Payer (1841-1915), the greatest Arctic explorer from the Czech lands and the most famous painter of polar landscapes. In 1876, he published in Vienna a travelogue “The Austro-Hungarian Expedition to the North Pole 1872-74",  together with an outline of the second German Expedition to the North Pole in 1869–70 and the polar expedition in 1871. A significant part of the book was published in Czech in 2019 under the title "The North Pole Expedition", and an exhibition of the author's illustrations is based on this edition. To emphasize Payer's artistic genius, the opening panel of exhibition features a reproduction of one of the four so-called Franklin Polar Cycle canvases. The painting "Starvation Cove" depicts the tragic end of Sir John Franklin's polar expedition of 1845. One of its later versions has been permanently exhibited since 1964 in the lecture hall of the Institute of Geophysics of the Czech Academy of Sciences in Prague 4 - Spořilová. The painting "Discovery of Wilczek Island" and the heliogravure "Never back!" are stored in the depository of the Regional Museum in Teplice.
Diplomat, translator and writer Zdeněk Lyčka is one of the promoters of Julius Payer's name and work in the Czech Republic and abroad. This is a case when polar research is popularized not only in words, but also in deeds - Zdeněk Lyčka himself crossed Greenland on skis, after that published a book "Skiing across Greenland".
"Sometimes people ask me why I go on such an expedition like this at all. People want to experience something they've only heard or read about, and want to prove it for themselves. He wants to overcome all sorts of prejudices and drive hundreds of kilometres without any help and learn everything that goes with it. He wants to conquer nature, which is completely impossible, and he wants to prove what kind of person he is, and yet he is a complete failure compared to the majestic world of eternal snow and ice," says Z. Lyčka.
The Embassy of the Czech Republic and the Department of Geology, Faculty of Sciences and Technologies, University of Latvia invite students, those interested in geology and polar exploration and supporters of the field to attend the event.