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Artist Statement:
contact e-mail:
slovakovamaria@yahoo.co.uk
Maria Slovakova has been
attending painting and drawing
art classes since age 5 and
exhibited extensively since
her teenage. Born and raised
in Czechoslovakia, lived many
places, including London,
Amsterdam, New York, Graz and
countryside of Quebec to name
a few. Her work has been
presented in large number of
galleries and alternative
spaces across Europe and both
Canada and the United States.
In NYC, she is featured at the
Living Museum. She’s been
residing Harrogate, United
Kingdom since spring 2005. She
is a member of an
international art group The
Mindwrestlers (shows included
Northline Gallery in Houston,
Texas, Arc Gallery in Chicago,
USA and Parsons College
Gallery in Paris, France). On
daily bases she is developing
several projects under the
hood of Maria Slovakova
Industries, her art company.
She mainly works with acrylic
paint and watercolours applied
to selected surfaces as well
as digitally with Illustrator.
She also performs her poems
and songs with invited
musicians under a name of
GerdaDear. On weekly bases she
works with ORB community
enterprise in Harrogate, where
she is developing an artspace.
For her poetry, she was
presented with Outstanding
Achievement in Poetry and
Editor'...
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Artist Exhibitions:
SOLO SHOWS
2005-6
.full colour grooves.’gate,
harrogate, england
2004
.koalas.wensenwerk, hague, the
netherlands
.toilets.NIL, graz, austria
2003
.i ain’t no vegetable baby i
am peace in a chunk of meat or
otomarfi and his silences
translated into english.
celery’s, graz, austria
alte technik, graz, ...
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Artist Galleries:
USA
Gallery at Metro, Orlando,
Florida, USA, contact Brad
Biggs, crystalhunting@aol.com
++1-407-5907603
Living Museum, Building 75,
Creedmoor 80-45 Winchester
Blvd, Queens village, NY, USA
Director Janos Morton, phone
contact: ++1-718-264 3490
Monkeyhouse Toys and Art
Gallery, Los Angeles
http://www.monkeyhousetoys.com
UK
...
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Collections:
Selected private collectors:
Gill Holland, NYC, USA
Robert Tulipan, NYC, USA
Jessica Yu, California, USA
Andy Hryc, Bratislava,
Slovakia
Michal Kascak, Slovakia
Daniel R. Bennett, London,
United Kingdom
Katarina Gasparova,
Bratislava, Slovakia
Martine Fordin, Inverness,
Quebec, Canada
Baldwin Baldwin, Bury, Quebec,
Canada
Jean Frederic Messier,
Montreal, Quebec, Canada
Lea Pascal, ...
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Commissions:
AIM charity office lobby,
murals, Huddersfield, United
Kingdom
Baodo im NIL, Graz,
Austria-toilets
Vieux St Pierre,
Victoriaville, Quebec,
Canada-toilets
Jason Adler, NYC,
USA-appartment interior
Jean Frederic Messier,
Montreal, Canada-Mercedes Benz
surface paintings
PH31, Amsterdam, Netherlands-
wall instalation
Forum Stadtpark, Graz,
Austria-outside mural
ABN AMRO Bank, ...
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Reviews for Maria Slovakova:
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The original internet version:
http://www.sme.sk/c/2637055/Zachod-je-pre-maliara-skvely-priestor
Interview by Marian Jaslovsky, SME newspaper
printed Saturday, March 18th 2005.
SME is a national daily paper in Slovakia, Europe.
Toilet is a great space for a painter.
Maria Slovakova- this name sounds extremely Slovak, but it’s owner is much more of a world traveller. She is a painter- she works and exhibits in many different countries. Wherever. She loves unusual spaces, inhabitants of Bratislava can enjoy her unique pictures at Cajovna v podzemi or Restaurant Prasna Basta, where she painted the interior of the toilets. Apart of that, she appears at major music festivals and of course, in ‘proper’ gallery spaces. Her pictures are simple, modern and they caress – looking like Josef Lada (major Czech painter and illustrator) decided to go pop art or grafitti. And as if painting would not be enough, Maria also writes poetry and makes music.
Nothing more important than art does not exist for her. It also saves her from herself, meaning to say, her diagnose.
-Your paintings can be found also at toilets in Slovakia as well as abroad. How did it happen?
It all started innocently in Bratislava’s restaurant Prasna Basta, when the manager asked artists Milan Prekop and Igor Derevenec to improve his toilets. I lived in Amsterdam at the time and they suggested for me to join in. So I got on the bus and helped out. It was fantastic, another helper happened to be Miso Kascak, with whom we also organized the opening party where we played music and sang. We generated a lot of unexpected publicity. I had some photos on my website and in my book and when the bar owner in Quebec saw them, he decided that he also wants colourful toilets. I was presenting an exhibition there so at the opening I had two accordion players performing at the toilets, while we did improvised theatre with one other actor…When we were shown around the apartment of movie director and producer Noah Harlan in NYC, we simply looked at each other and it was clear. I painted his toilet as a birthday gift.
-What attracts you in this environment?
I always welcome when I am allowed to paint what I want in an interesting space. In the toilets are good wall angles, mirrors, dryers, pipes. It’s interesting. Art should be accessible and toilet is probably the most private place where a person can happen to be. Also, in public spots, it’s a very busy place. What can a creator want more than a direct attention from a visitor? From toilets I moved to a few full interiors, but that’s another chapter. Work with functional space is fascinating.
-What can be a functional space for you?
I did music clubs, different rooms and spaces in apartments, front door, large mural on the side of an art centre, cars, currently I am developing a concept of children’s room and we are in talks for some murals. I think that art belongs everywhere, so I am doing my best to be there.
-How did you start with art?
In first grade in primary school I walked into the LSU (part time art school) my first choice was piano, but the class was already full. So I went next door and signed up for fine art. The next important moment was when two of the members of the band The Moonflowers from Bristol, England asked me to send them drawings because they liked what they have seen. The responsibility stroke and I started to create my own style .After high school I moved to Bristol and got more involved in events organized by their Pop God Record label. I draw and write pretty much all the time. By now people take me for an artist. They know that I always have time if they need to get something done.
-How did you meet a band from Bristol in Slovakia?
The Moonflowers had a concert at Rock Fabric Danubius club in Bratislava where I often served as a translator, because back then not too many people could speak English. It was a great place, I also had my first solo show there and I painted the windows in a bar.
-Some people say that anyone could paint your paintings. What do you think about their opinion?
I totally agree with them. Only, as one of my friends said, they would have to think of it first. Another thing is that I actually want these pictures to give the impulse to people to relate to art easier. It happened to me few times that people told me that they don’t understand art, but like what I do. That is a good enough motor for me to keep going.
-How did it happen that you chose the travellers shoes in place of the cozy settled life?
To my great luck, in 1987, the authorities gave me (13) and my mom a permit to go to Canada to visit my stepbrother and some other family. So I started learning languages and travelling pretty young. I wanted the option of free movement between the countries ever since. When they established Slovak Republic, I was already away. By now, it’s not so clear no more where I really belong. Because I was fluent in English, I started off in London as au-pair. Four months later I moved to Bristol and hang around The Moonflowers and their friends for a while. I went to Amsterdam for a weekend and stayed for 5 years. Later on I started working with a mobile theatre in Quebec. When I needed a stamp in my passport, NYC was the nearest. Because it slipped out that I am selling paintings in Canada, the border officer did not let me back in because my visa did not cover that. So, with a backpack of clothes and $150
I started around different parts of New York. Graz and Hague followed. In the end the family stepped in and I ended up in state hospital where I got fixed by electroshock therapy. Now I take pills and they say I have schizophrenia. Something new at all times. Life is a one big surprise.
-How is it to live with such diagnose?
Art is the best antidepressant. If I would not have my art and writing I don’t know in which clinic I would be stuck in. Sure, I had depressions, my life was full of tough moments. But luckily for me, my happiness line is set very low. Don’t need much to have a smile on my face and be satisfied.
-To many people, schizophrenia means that one is a fool. Are you a fool?
I was always pretty orderly functioning being with a large scale imagination.
No weirdness or addictions. In year 2000 I met a 74 year old Tibetan teacher who boosted me up with such spiritual energy that it took me 5 years to come back to reality. Rational thinking departed to the tropics and friends and family worried. So I ended up in the first mental institution. More followed automatically. Once you get diagnosed and you refuse taking the pills, the police is allowed to put you back in the care of the doctors. So I am now a veteran of several institutions in 3 different countries. It’s part of my life. When 6 people enforced the first injection into my system I screamed my head off. I was macrobiotic at the time and I kept away of all chemicals. First thing that came to my mind was that that dose will kill me. It took 5 years till my brain somehow accepted the prescribed drugs. I can function pretty much normal now. I have a goal in life that I follow. Diagnose, no diagnose. To my luck, Living Museum sells my paintings in NYC, it’s an art space where people heal while spending time at one rough mental hospital. I spent 6 months there. But if I would think of every person that takes me for a fool, my life would be very complicated.
-You paint, but also write poetry and make music. We did not mention that yet.
I ‘m glad people like my writing. In September last year, I was given an Editor’s Choice Award by Howard Ely, editor of International Library of Poetry in Maryland. It was for a poem called Honesty. He included me in 3 poetry collections already. One of them is The Best Of Poems and Poets 2005. Musically speaking, we recorded a demo in Graz with my .GerdaDear. ensemble back in 2003. When a Dutchman David van der Wal heard it, he liked the vocals but complained about the music. He offered to record me and put it out on his Plant Records. What I heard from his production I really liked so I am very excited about this. David has great ideas and a well equipped studio so it’s a real honour to work with him. Really looking forward to this process. It combines it all. Can’t wait to do the cover and some videos.
-Don’t you miss roots, long term relationships with people? Or does this frequent change of people and places suit you? What thing or a person do you hang onto apart of art?
I have a few great friends who I call and write to from anywhere I am. I also have the family, even though I usually spare them from the details of my existence. They are only human after all. I have my beautiful auntie Ota who got me out of financial and other uneasy moments few times. My art school teacher Danka Zacharova was a big supporter in my wish to make it as a visual artist. And the fact that I am an orphan since grade 8 in primary school helped a lot to the whole lifestyle of mine. I had to resolve the emotional independence very quickly if I wanted to get on in life. I try to depend on me and me only as much as possible and be a local not a stranger in places I live. I am a dedicated independent spirit. I protect my freedom deeply. Potential partners usually give up after a while, because I think of work pretty much all the time. I am simply not programmed to plan names of my future children.
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