Anna Macková (1887-1969)

LANE IN KORČULA

1924
Colour woodcut on hand-made paper, 30x22,5 cm (53x42 cm), recto in pencil lower right below the print area the author`s signature and date "A. Macková 24", verso in pencil the title of the work "Ulička v Korčule". In this print Macková abandons broad landscape views and concentrates on the intimate space of a town alley, enclosed by high walls and the dramatic contrast of light and shadow. The composition is built on the passage from the dark foreground into the luminous space, where sunlight models the architecture into flat, colour-graded volumes. The perspective is not illusionistic but rhythmicised – the pavement, staircase and façades create a decorative structure in which space transforms into ornament. This approach links Macková with the line of the modern colour woodcut of the early 20th century, with the decorative colour culture of graphics from the circle of the Wiener Werkstätte, but also with the domestic tradition of the Czech modern woodcut represented by Josef Váchal or František Kobliha. As with them, this is not a topographical record, but a subjective image of a place – architecture experienced as an interplay of light, colour and rhythm, in which Mediterranean reality transforms into a timeless, almost scenic composition.