Jitka Hanzlová

From Rokytník, 1990⁠–⁠94 (a memory trace, time capsule) towards Water, 2013⁠–⁠2019 (a source and flow, the praise of life), through Bewohner, 1994⁠–⁠1996 (a testimony, an evidence of presence) and Vanitas, 2008⁠–⁠2012 (passing of time and disappearance), Hanzlová’s alchemy of silence labors the world of critical intimacy which foregrounds the subject matter’s social, cultural and political sense of belonging. Jitka Hanzlová’s oeuvre carries a silence; each image seems a vehicle of silence. It delivers a stillness; not the stillness of the photographic medium though as Hanzlová’s pictures are moments set in motion; we trace them, follow them, step by step, frame by frame, location by location. From one person to another, a collection of faces and gestures unfolds in an almost cinematic sequence of gazes in suspense and bodies in freeze. Eyes confronting eyes, quietly, in expectation. Silence appears always in plural, silence with a companion of silence in a looped sequence of absence and presence. 

"Silences" is the first substantial survey of the artist’s work in her native country and it covers over three decades of Hanzlová’s prolific career.

The book includes essays by Adam Budak and Urs Stahel, a conversation between Jitka Hanzlová and Zdenek Felix and a rich visual material.

This catalogue was published on occasion of the exhibition "Jitka Hanzlová: Silences" at National Gallery Prague in 2019.