Adolf ZIKA - photographer, director, producer

Curriculum vitae

Adolf Zika was born in 1972 in the town of Prachatice. In 1994, he began with photography and a year later won first place in the most contended category of the Czech Press Photo. In the fall of the year 2000, he was selected among six photographers of the world to represent the renowned brand Leica at Photokina in Cologne and was given the same honor by the Olympus brand four years later. Adolf Zika’s photographs were already sold at the Paris Photo in Louvre and many other countries throughout the world.

He is the author of the largest printed project of the year 2000, the narrative publication THE LAST BOOK OF THE CENTURY, A Day in the Life of Czech Republic. In the summer of 2006, with the support of the Hasselblad and Leica companies, he took photographs for his planned publication 6 DAYS AND 24 HOURS OF LE MANS, a non-traditional view of the most famous automobile race in the world. And in the same year, a partly retrospective book of black-and-white photographs LUXURIOUS LUMINISCENCE appeared on counters in the Czech Republic and Slovakia.

Adolf Zika worked for many prestigious fashion labels such as Pietro Filipi, Hermès, Australian Bodycare, Speedo and many others. In 2001, he began long-term cooperation with the mobile operator Orange. He has also created many front covers and beautiful pictorials for the Playboy magazine. From the year 2001 till 2005, Adolf Zika became the official photographer of the racing team Ferrari Menx, with whom he traveled throughout Europe.

Since 2001, Adolf Zika has directed over one hundred television spots. He yet again dedicated himself to the world of fast cars in 2006 and 2007, the result of which is an extensive photographic publication, capturing the dramatic moments of the A1GP season as well as a peek behind the scenes of every race.

In 2007, as the screenwriter and director, he finished a feature documentary film about the world renowned photographer Jan Saudek, entitled JAN SAUDEK - TRAPPED BY HIS PASSIONS, NO HOPE FOR RESCUE. The film was made in Czech-American co-production. In the following year, the film was awarded the Glass Eye Award for the Best Documentary Film at EuroFest Montreal in Canada.

In 2008, Adolf Zika directed a feature documentary film about the most famous automobile race in the world, 24 Hours of Le Mans, entitled LE MANS PHENOMENON. The film was picked among the best sports documentaries at the World FICTS Challenge - Sport Movies & TV, a series of 14 festivals on 5 continents.

In 2009, ONE YEAR OF MY LIFE in 3285 Pictures by Adolf Zika in Co-operation with Leica was published, a worldwide unique photography project, which illustrates one year of the ordinary as well as extraordinary life of Adolf Zika in nine photographs a day. Based on the main idea of this book, in the same year he founded the web project WEEK OF LIFE, a unique documentary project, which aims to create the largest photo library of humanity. It became a part of the Czech cultural heritage and spread to almost 50 countries around the world.

A year later, he once again sat in the director’s chair and directed the documentary film SILENT PASSION.

In October 2010, the book IN THE SHADOW OF LIGHT was published. It contains not only black-and-white nudes, but also raw portraits of personalities or images of landscape where time ceases to exist. In any case, nude artistic photography dominates and forms the main body of this remarkable publication.

In 2012, Zika directed a feature documentary film composed of collected footage sent by citizens of the Czech Republic, THE CZECH LAND, YOUR HOME!. In the same year, he was awarded the prestigious METRO Zlatá pecka 2011 award for the TV spot “Anthem”.

In 2014, he decided to make his first feature film, RUMBLING. The film won the major award for the best feature film at the International Motorcycle Film Festival in New York.

A year later, Adolf Zika transformed an extraordinary story of the Olympic champion Lukáš Krpálek into the feature documentary THE GOLDEN MAN FROM RIO.

In 2017, the first part of the portrait photography book CHARISMA was published, capturing exceptional personalities and inner charm of both Czech and foreign cultural and public figures.

In 2018, he finished his sixth film, ROBERT VANO – THE STORY OF A MAN.

A year later, Zika in collaboration with Czech Television created a 30-part series of short documentaries, entitled VELVET FOOTPRINTS, which through 30 photographs captures the turning points or significant moments between 17 November 1989 and the end of 2018.

In 2020, Zika in collaboration with Czech Television made the feature documentary SPRING IN EMERGENCY, an unexpected, visually interesting and original view of how the COVID-19 epidemic, quarantine and state of emergency have changed us.

On his photographic journeys, he visited more than 50 countries all over the world.

www.adolfzika.com