Untitled
Anna Zemánková
ANNA KEMÁNKOVÁ, c.1970, PASTEL ON PAPER WITH YARN
To be the black sheep of art brut (raw art) is perhaps to be the most brut of them all. And yet, the only rawness within Anna Zemánková’s work is that of nature - the raw, naturally-engineered edge of plant-like beauty. Born from her growing mood swings and at the insistence of her sons, the Czech painter began to create again as an adult, decades after he gave her practice up. As her career progressed, she began to integrate the techniques with which she had previously used in motherhood, decorating her home and clothes into her artistic practice. Here, Zemánková combines pastel drawing and crochet appliqué with embroidery, conjuring herbariums of vaguely vegetable-like forms. Her fascination with the debauchery of floral shape and colour characterised her career, stating proudly “I grow flowers that grow nowhere else.”