Artsplaining

Martina Smutná (born 1989) is a PhD student at the Academy of Fine Arts in Prague. Smutná's artistic work is connected with her interest and activities in the feminist-thinking field. Her main topics are the women’s work and the way it is displayed in western society. The paintings emphasize her own position in context of the art production. Believing in the notion "personal is political" Smutná puts it in the wider social context. She was a finalist in the EXIT Award (2015), the Critics' Award (2014), she participated in residence program at the “Izolyatsia” Cultural Center in Kiev and at the Czech Center in Bucharest. She currently conducts her PhD research at the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna where she develops her doctoral subject that focused on the origin and consequences of using the gender-different indication, such as "female painting". She considers her artistic work as a language in which she talks about intimate, personal subjects but also general social issues. The last series of her paintings depicts a family and traditions and the risk of a generational traditions transfer, hat can serve as an attempt to maintain “sameness”, which is the driving force of conservative policies (Beyond nuclear family).

Interview by curator and art historian Anezka Jaburkova.