Art Talent Show review – witty interrogation of art students asks the big questions

Hopefuls for the Academy of Fine Arts in Prague face a probing from their professors in a documentary that looks for answers about art, institutions and ourselves

Shot over the course of a week-long entrance examination held by the Academy of Fine Arts in Prague, this rigorous yet witty documentary brings to mind the observational, accumulative style of Frederick Wiseman; film-makers Adéla Komrzý and Tomáš Bojar are interested not only in the individual subjects, but also the hidden machinations of cultural institutions.

Designed to weed out the less qualified entrants, the first stage of the exam involves drawing portraits of live subjects. The second round, however, is when things get more interesting. In addition to a written test on art history, the applicants are asked to respond to prompts such as climate change. The film only affords us glimpses of the resulting artworks, but much more screen time is devoted to the professors’ probing questions on the taboos and raisons d’etre behind artmaking, queries that aim to jolt prospective students out of tired cliche and preconceived notions about the lives of artists.