The geometrical painting titled Painting 33 dates back to 1969 and comes from the artist’s peak creative period...

 

Inventory No.: O-522

Artist: Jarmila Čihánková
Title: Painting 33

Year: 1969
Technique: oil
Material: canvas
Dimensions: 140,5 x 105,5 cm
Signature: bottom right “JČ 69”; brush

The geometrical painting titled Painting 33 dates back to 1969 and comes from the artist’s peak creative period. The artist has chosen circle as one of the painting’s key elements that make it feel more “kinetic”. Even though the red rectangle that is topped with painted geometry is flat, it creates an illusion of volume – of an object. The geometrical symmetry of the two light semicircles, two light rectangles and the central wine-coloured pattern that is centrally divided by a black line “glowing green” with two black rectangles on both sides, these all call us into the world of Čihánková’s (un)boundedness.

Any work that includes abstract geometry has an astonishing quality – even though it may seem artificial and impersonal, it is the other way around. Any artwork featuring geometry can liberate human spirit, it is not heavy nor bounding. It supports free and unbounded thinking and this is also true in the case of this artwork.

Jarmila Čihánková has been a part of the national history of art since the 1960s when she became known as a textile artist (art protis technique), painter, graphic artist and drawer. Her work is built on the foundations of abstract geometry. The 1960s are known for their interest in paintings’ focal point. She was a member of an art group known as Group 4 – together with Oľga Bartošíková, Tamara Klimová, Viera Kraicová.

The artist’s geometry-focused feeling and her sense for visual rhythm and colourfulness lie at the core of her creative work. Her personal drive led her to participate at the establishment of the Slovak part of the Concretist Club. She taught at the Department of Stage and Costume Design at the Academy of Performing Arts and the School of Applied Arts in Bratislava. Her work was based on folk ornaments design. Her art environment “Set of Blocks” was very successful at the Biennial of Tapestry in Lausanne.

Jarmila Čihánková (born 26 May 1925 in Roštín, CZ) has lived and worked in Smolenice (near Trnava) for many years now. She studied under Ľudovít Fulla at the Slovak University of Technology in Bratislava (1942—1945) and at the Academy of Arts, Architecture and Design in Prague (1945—1950).

Selected solo exhibitions: 1969 – Jarmila Čihánková – Objects (with Tamara Klimová), Czechoslovak Cultural Centre, Warsaw, 1969 – Art Protis, Solingen,1969 – Art Protis, Club of the Slovak Art Fund, Bratislava,1971 – Art Protis (with Anton Cepka), Göttingen,1976 – Tapestry Art Protis, Cyprián Majerník Gallery, Bratislava, 2005 – Selected Artworks, Ján Koniarek Gallery, Trnava

Selected Group Exhibitions: 1959 – Contemporary Slovak Graphic Art, Moscow,1959 – Group 4 (with Oľga Bartošíková, Tamara Klimová and Viera Kraicová), Bratislava,1960 – Czechoslovak Tapestry, Brussels, 1962 – Group 4, Bratislava, 1964 – Contemporary Slovak Art, Havana, 1966 – Group 4, Václav Špála Gallery, Prague,1966 – Group 4, Cyprián Majerník Gallery, Bratislava, 1968 – The Concretist Club, Jihlava; Žilina; Ústí nad Labem; Prague; Stuttgart; Düsseldorf 1969 – The Concretist Club, Carlsbad; Olomouc; Bratislava; Florence; Rome; Venice; Turin; Portici; Nijmegen; Scheweningen; Amsterdam; Vienna; Brno, 1969 – Slovak Art, Cairo; Alexandria, Baghdad,1970 – Polymusic Space, Piešťany, 1971 – 5th International Biennial of Tapestry, Lausanne.; Warsaw,1971 – 100 Contemporary Tapestries, Lausanne, 1971 – Art Protis, Lausanne; Belgrade; Carlsbad; Hradec Králové, 1972 – Czechoslovak Tapestry – Art Protis, Algiers; Tunisia,1972 – Art Protis, Cuxhaven; Remeš; Vienna; Prešov; Hodonín, 1972 – Interliving 72 Art Protis, Ósaka, 1972 – Art Protis, San Francisco, 1973 – Art Protis (SAGA) – tour, USA; Kanada; Saarbrücken, 1973 – Illustration after 1945, Schiedam; Moscow, 1975 – Czechoslovak Tapestry, Lodz; Warsaw, Budapest 1975 – Woman in the world of Tomorrow, Bratislava; Banská Bystrica 1976 – Art Protis, Magdeburg, 1978 – Czechoslovak Tapestry – Art Protis, Alma-Ata; Vilnius 1982 – Art Forms of Today in Textile and Glass Art, Berlin 1995 – Slovak Fine Art of 1960s, Slovak National Gallery, Bratislava 1997 – The Concretist Club, Jihlava; Carlsbad; Zlín; Hluboká nad Vltavou; Slovak National Gallery, Bratislava; Novohrad Gallery Lučenec, 2001 – The Concretist Club, House of Arts, Opava

Ľudmila Kasaj Poláčková

Sources:
www.webumenia.sk
Ľuba Belohradská – Eva Trojanová: Hranice Geometrie [Geometry Borders], Petum, Bratislava, 2009