ARTIST STATEMENT

1) Sum up the main character of your work your long-term interests and themes.

The main, long term leitmotif of my works are identity and tradition. My parents are foreigners and I was born and grew up in a different country than they did. I couldn't learn their tradition and history. Instead, I had to learn the Czech ones, but still, after many years, I face many misunderstandings.I see these misunderstandings differently and the term I use for them is: different view. In my works it can be understood partly as authenticity and partly as errors. That's why I am very interested in contrasts vs. similarities. I don't work on the individual artworks but on the sets of the works. At the beginning there is the idea and then I am looking for the most fitting form.  I seek the perfect balance between the message and a quality handicraft technique.

There are more sources of inspiration in my work. One part is from everyday life, the other part is based on observation of events that surround me. The big source for my texts are stories that other people tell me. As a result, I combine these sources. The sourcebook for my ornamental embroideries in glass from the set Inner Feeling is The Grammar of Ornament by Owen Jones. As a reference I perceive Czech artists Adriena Šimotová and Inez Tuschnerová and from abroad it's Severija Inčirauskaitė-Kriaunevičienė or the installation Horizontal Darkness in Search of Solidarity by Oscar Murillo and the dirty corporeal mysteries by Louise Bourgeois. They´re all storytellers and they all deal with topics like cultural context or identity in their work, reflecting their conceptual message in a strong and unique handicraft technique. There´s a strong similarity in the way they depict the mysteries of human nature and bodily symbols.

I differ from other intermedia artists in approach to individual works. I don't see any of my work like a completed unit. I see all of my works like one big artwork which is slowly growing. I mark individual works with a numerical series and include them in the collective name for the file. As well, I don’t believe in the sentence: It is not possible. I think this is my strength side. I don't give up easily and that's why I found the possibility how to overstep the border of the glass. My weakness is that my works take a long time to make, and it means I don't make so many works like other artists around me.

4) What is your work process like? Do you deal with preparation and research? How do you search for your themes? How do you choose the media you work in?

My works are a reaction to the current world situation. I deal with topics intuitively. Nowadays I focus mostly on social seclusion and I have been working with the topic of identity for a long time. I process every topic through sets of artworks. Sometimes it took a couple of years. For each message, I try to find the best form that's why I work with different kinds of media. For a long time I collect handicrafts techniques and I try to move them to the current context. I collect the techniques based on the recommendation of old generations, and I am also looking for them in antiquarians and libraries. For me personally it is important to use recycled material, which others threw to the trash. I am the protagonist of slow lifestyle and environmental responsibility is part of it.

5)What is your vision for the future? How do you want to develop your work and continue your previous projects/realizations?

My vision of the future is clear:  I will continue my artistic work at all costs. Due to the costs of maintaining an equipped studio I can imagine moving my future working space outside the city. I would love to give my artworks more space generally and later expand to public space. Most of my works are very fragile and technologically demanding at the same time and that's why such a move would be a big challenge for me. My long-term dream is to publish a book, which I have unfinished. I wish to get this book to the general public.