Child’s dream

Installation in the room The Miss Kot’átková

Eva Koťátková takes as her central theme the individual’s relationship to normative social structures and institutions, such as governments, schools, or families. In her sculptures, performances, drawings, and collages she gives form to the invisible, disciplining force exerted by rules, conventions, and rituals: cage-like objects, acting as physical restraints for body parts, cut-out illustrations from medical textbooks, and images of people tangled up in strings are recurring motifs in her work.

Poetic, darkly humorous, and occasionally ominous, Koťátková counts Czech surrealism and absurdist literature among her sources of inspiration. Koťátková is struck by the peculiarly poor fit between the world of ideas, theories, rules and codes, and the people who must live with them, struggling to conform, to sit up straight, to follow lessons, abide by set principles. They are often trying, and failing, to break free, and the consequences may be strikingly absurd.

In this work in particular, the artist uses collage – a technique widely adopted in Surrealism, and also much loved by her because of its intrinsic nature – to combine fragments and different elements into new compositions. She created a box: a space into in which to explore private thoughts, intimate visions, dreams, as well as the anxieties, fears, and struggles of contemporary society.