Lot 69: EMILA MEDKOVÁ (1928-1985)

Figure, 1959
gelatin silver print
signed, titled in Czech, dated in ink and credit stamp (on the verso)
15 1/4 x 11 1/2 in. (38.7 x 29.2cm.)

Medková studied photography at the State School of Graphic Arts in Prague. In 1951 she married her mentor, the painter Mikulas Medek. Medek's circle included many leading contemporary Czech artists whose work and ideas had a powerful impact on Medková's own approach to taking photographs. After the Communist takeover in 1948, however, many artists, including Medek, were blacklisted and, Medkova was forced to set aside photography to support her family. A major retrospective of her photographs was held in Prague in 2001-2002. In an associated interview Medková described her work, illustrated vividly by lot 69, thus: 'If there is no mystery in a photograph, if its reality has no other design, then it is empty. It is not a matter of description of objects...but rather a matter of what is evoked.'