Alice Máselníková: Where we belong to earth, not the other way round
26. 4. − 21. 6. 2023
curator: Lenka Sýkorová
photo: Markéta Bendová
video: Tereza Havlínková
Searching for the meaning of life is a mission. Spirituality, religion, faith in one’s own capacities, love for the other and passion for the fulfillment of life are companions on this journey. It creates the framework of being itself. The nature from which we emerged and to which we will again return is a universe for us that cannot be abandoned. If we are able to connect to it truly, nature can also be a great companion. In Scandinavian mythology, the tree of life Yggdrasil takes the form of a cosmic ash tree that connects our earthly existence, stretching vertically from the underworld to heavens. With its roots and branches it embraces both the inner and outer human world and is the source of cosmic wisdom. Alice Máselníková is inspired in her work by this very mythology, and through drawing and painting, she opens up possible ways of searching for the meaning of everyday life, the fragility of a moment of joy, or the all-embracing ordinary beauty that we are surrounded by. Cooling down in a stream, climbing trees or just observing other animal and plant "beings" plays out in her pictorial scenes, which are loosely inspired by the history of art from the Renaissance to surrealist works. She opens up to us an enlightened inner world full of intimate-intuitive gestures, but also universal truths.
In the works of Alice Máselníková, the emphasis on physicality, the author's poetry and the effort to capture the fleeting moment of the present intertwine. Through painting, drawing and text, the artist explores small daily experiences and gestures - how we communicate with each other and how we touch our loved ones, how far we are willing to go to escape our existential loneliness, or how we look at ordinary everyday objects. Alice Máselníková prepared a site-specific installation for Altán Klamovka, which reflects the transience of day-to-day experiences of intimacy, but also encourages a journey of searching for lost certainties and worlds.
Alice Máselníková is a Czech painter and curator based in Stockholm. She is one of the three directors of the Supermarket - Stockholm Independent Art Fair, the founder of the artist-run space the Flat Octopus and the project leader of the European project Artist-Run Network Europe. Máselníková holds a BA (Hons) in Fine Art and Philosophy from Duncan of Jordanstone College of Arts and Design, Dundee, and an MA in Curating Art from Stockholm University. She also studied Fine Art at the Polytechnic University of Valencia. Her work has been exhibited in a number of solo and group exhibitions (most recently Köttinspektionen, Uppsala; Gallery of Fine Art, Náchod; Berg Gallery, Stockholm; Eulengasse, Frankfurt; and top e.V., Berlin) and is represented in several private and public collections in Sweden and internationally.
Lenka Sýkorová