The concept of the historically focused collection exhibition How to Collect Art: the Karel Tutsch Story will be expanded by a series of exhibitions of the youngest generation of artists, current students or graduates from art school studios. In this way, the curators will revive Tutsch's basic strategy of discovering and presenting the works of previously unknown artists in a new context. Gallery Na bidýlku II will thus become a laboratory for new approaches to the traditional medium of painting and installation, whose transformations Tutsch has followed and supported for several decades.
Martina Strakošová is a graduate of Ostrava University’s Video-Multimedia-Performance Studio, where she studied under Jiří Surůvka and Barbora Mikudová. Although the roots of her work are in painting, which for her remains an intimately familiar artistic language, she is not afraid to cross predefined boundaries between media. Her works are a testament, a personal diary in which viewers can identify or lose themselves. Strakošová works mainly with painting, embroidery, object art, video, sound and installations. She also frequently experiments with other unusual materials such as distinctive textiles, glitter, glue guns, beads, wire, or foam sealant. These different methods of representation usually build on and complement each other. The artist usually focuses on emotions and uses her works to let viewers see their own inner soul.
Strakošová makes art under the pseudonym CHMURKA, which possesses two hidden meaning: it is the Polish word for “little cloud” and also the Czech word for a dark cloud or sadness and worries.
In her works, the artist shares her personal experiences and strong feelings such as love, pain and fear. She does not shy away from the use of abstract forms. You may at first glance see sweet, light, pink and lightly ironic works, but appearances can be deceptive. Behind a mask of original, inimitable and expressively conceived surfaces, there hides a fragility that asks not so much for our pity as for our attention. Love, joy, fear, vulnerability – they are all present, hidden beneath a thin layer of glitter. In the world of Martina Strakošová, shiny glitter is mixed with bitterness. The plush softness and tenderness of pastel colours hides the edges of emotions than cannot be easily identified. Her works are more than aesthetic scenes; they offer a glimpse of places where emotions have not words but only colours, textures and moods. The central motifs of her works are love and an escape from reality into private worlds where you can find relief from the worries and burdens of the real world. For Martina Strakošová, art is a matter of the heart, and her work is an activity that she cannot live without.
Strakošová’s motifs are inspired by primitive symbols, children’s naïve art and contemporary trends from the online world. She repeatedly chooses themes that possess multiple meanings. Typical examples include the cloud (a symbol of mystery, but also hope, as when the sun comes out after a storm) and fire as a symbol of energy and passion, but also danger and ruin. We shouldn’t forget that fire not only destroys – it also gives life. Another common element in the artist’s work are dragons. They can be seen as fairy-tale creatures guarding a treasure or a princess, but also as symbols of wisdom, fortune, strength and being in harmony with nature. At the same time, they can represent destruction, chaos, power and rule. In psychology, dragons stand for the archetype of the shadow – the suppression of certain forces in the human mind, of our inner demons. Another motif that Strakošová likes to use is the heart, specifically the heart symbol. One of the most universal and most recognised shapes in the world, it represents love and tenderness and embodies life, but it can also stand for a broken, wounded heart. One might say that there are dragons dancing in the heart of CHMURKA, and whenever a dark cloud appears in her world, flowing tears are transformed into little hearts and glitter.
