SPRING/SUMMER 2014 - boersenblatt.net

Jitka Hanzlová
Cotton Rose
Jitka Hanzlová has traversed contexts, identities and cultures in a quest for the meaning of belonging that lies at the
heart of her images.
The photographs in Cotton Rose were taken in the Gifu Prefecture of Japan. Hanzlová strongly resisted the long
tradition of travel journals written about Japan, showing a foreign and exotic country.
Since Jitka Hanzlová defected from the Communist regime in Czechoslovakia in 1982 she has sought to explore her
experiences through photography, producing a body of work at once poetic and truthful. Hanzlová’s photography
is in constant pursuit of the relationship between the individual and the context in which people live. It scrutinizes
the ways in which home and surroundings indelibly shape identity. Drawing on her own life story, Hanzlová’s photographs
also speak of a more universal longing for a sense of place. Her photographic voice has always been a
muted and gentle mirror of her sympathetic approach.
Jitka Hanzlová, born 1958 in the former CSSR/Czech Republic, escaped to Germany in 1982. Between 1987 and
1994 she studied visual communication at Essen University with focus on photography. She has been awarded
several photography awards, including the BMW—Paris Photo Prize 2007. Venues for solo exhibitions of her work
have included, among others, the Museum Folkwang, Essen, Fotomuseum Winterthur, Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam,
Deichtorhallen Hamburg, Fundacion MAPFRE, Madrid, and the National Gallery of Edinburgh.
Jitka Hanzlová
Cotton Rose
Text by Ulf Erdmann Ziegler
Book design by Jitka Hanzlová
112 pages
7.1 × 10 in. / 18 × 25,5 cm
46 photographs
Four-color process
Hardcover half-linen bound
€ 38.00 / £ 32.00 / US$ 48.00
ISBN 978-3-86930-127-3
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