Bugonia and Alien Bees
Anna Hulačová
The first solo exhibition of Anna Hulačová (1984, Sušice, Czechia) in Austria evolves on the topic of beekeeping and equilibrates both its utopian and dystopian sentiments. Hulačová creates figurative sculptures of hybrid bodies that combine both the technological and organic in form and material. Her thinking grows not only theoretically but also practically from agriculture, with a soft approach to technology and a precise and personal relationship to matter. She imagines a cultural-agricultural revolution based on the optics of entomology, in which the microcosms of insects allow not only for a certain escape from the desperate present, but also for contextualisation and complexification of our own horticultural position. Her sculptures freely draw on the history of Czech folklore and socialist concrete sculptures in addition to 1990s western esotericism, UFOs and crop circle iconology. These diverse resources create visual roots that testify to the many contradictions in our definition and relation to nature.
The exhibition is curated by Michal Novotný, director of the Collection of Art after 1945 at the National Gallery Prague.
The exhibition is conceived in collaboration with the National Gallery Prague.
Photocredit: © Manuel Carreon Lopez
