I was born in Bratislava. My father was a forester, my mother a pianist.

As a boy I played the violin, did sports, but mostly I drew.

In 1967, I made it to Paris. It was a different world.

Freedom, colors, museums. I told myself, this is what real life looks like.

A year later the tanks came. I was in the center of Bratislava when the shooting began.

Plaster fell from the walls, people ran into basements. I ran too, thinking war was starting.

I enrolled in art school. Professor Matejka taught me. He was amazing.

Then normalization came and professors were fired, one after another.

One day the bursar Orlík called me in. He said it should be an honor to join the Party.

I was 21 years old. I told him no.

We lived through friendships. Musicians, artists, theorists.

We created our own world, an island of freedom.

We managed exhibitions and happenings.

I retyped Havel’s Power of the Powerless on a typewriter. Every time there were consequences, interrogations, intimidation.

The state security officers did not understand art. They had no idea what abstraction was, or why it could be dangerous.

Everything reached them from those who informed on us.

In the 1980s I had exhibitions abroad too.

In the USA or Germany, you were welcomed with a smile. At home, you faced bans and surveillance.

In November 1989, I went to see Miro Cipár in the morning. On the way I met Ľubo Longauer. He asked, are we going?

That evening the Umelecká beseda was already full.

The first days were full of tension. On Hviezdoslav Square, a dog barked and we all got scared the police were coming.

After the revolution, I taught at VŠVU and helped build a new system for the school.

Today I believe art has meaning when it opens questions. And freedom always comes at a price.