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Thread drawing, (untitled), ca. 1968
Luba Krejčí
Thread drawing, (untitled),
Luba Krejčí,
*1081

Thread drawing, (untitled),
ca. 1968

Luba Krejčí
*1081
g1Y2
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Museum für Gestaltung Zürich
Ausstellungsstrasse 60
8031 Zurich
Museum map
Museum für Gestaltung Zürich
Toni-Areal, Pfingstweidstrasse 94
8031 Zurich
Pavillon Le Corbusier
Höschgasse 8
8008 Zürich
Museum map
  • (untitled) Luba Krejčí Thread drawing
  • (untitled) Luba Krejčí Thread drawing
  • (untitled) Luba Krejčí Thread drawing
  • (untitled) Luba Krejčí Thread drawing
  • (untitled) Luba Krejčí Thread drawing
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Listen to the text
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With her poetic thread drawings, the textile artist Luba Krejčí (1925–2005) was a unique figure in the Fiber Art movement of the 1960s. In her own unorthodox way, she managed to reinvent the traditional bobbin lace technique.

In addition to scenic images that harmoniously merge human and animal, Luba Krejčí also created a series of individual women’s heads. Topped by windblown hair, the faces stare out at us with empty eyes and open mouths. Ending abruptly at the neck, they exhibit the concentrated facial expressions of passport photos, with a coarse grain due to the textile technique applied. Krejčí revived in her thread drawings the ancient bobbin lace technique. Without using a preliminary sketch or cardboard base, she first wove waxed linen thread into a dense facial surface and then crafted the texture of the hair using the bobbin lace method. The result is a stark contrast between the static, expressionless countenance and the animated head of hair. Though Krejčí lived during eventful times—like the suppression of the Prague Spring with the use of savage force—it is not known whether her works represent a political commentary. What we can say for certain, however, is that Luba Krejčí’s images attest to a great familiarity with textile techniques, which she learned in a three-year course in dressmaking in her Czech homeland in the 1940s, followed by studies in textile design at the schools of applied arts in Brno and Prague. From the mid-1950s onward, she was active in the Center for Folk Art in Czechoslovakia, advocating for the preservation and further development of traditional craft techniques. (Sabine Flaschberger)

Fadenbild, um 1968
Entwurf/Ausführung: Luba Krejčí
Material/Technik: Leinenzwirn, gewachst, Klöppelspitze
41 × 31 cm
Donation: Ica Bally-Trevisani
Eigentum: Museum für Gestaltung Zürich / ZHdK
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Literature

Sigrid Barten (Hg.), Textilkunst 1950–1990. Sammlung Museum Bellerive Zürich, Zürich 1991.

Erika Billeter, in: Ausstellungs-Broschüre Gewerbezentrum / Showroom Jürg Bally, Zollikon 1968.

https://collection.cooperhewitt.org

Image credits

Fadenbild, um 1968, Entwurf/Ausführung: Luba Krejčí, Donation: Ica Bally-Trevisani
Abbildung: Museum für Gestaltung Zürich / ZHdK

Fadenbild, 1968, Entwurf/Ausführung: Luba Krejčí, Donation: Ica Bally-Trevisani
Abbildung: Museum für Gestaltung Zürich / ZHdK

Fadenbild, 1968, Entwurf/Ausführung: Luba Krejčí, Donation: Ica Bally-Trevisani
Abbildung: Museum für Gestaltung Zürich / ZHdK

Wandbehang, Die seltsamen Freunde, 1968, Entwurf/Ausführung: Luba Krejčí, Donation: Ica Bally-Trevisani
Abbildung: Museum für Gestaltung Zürich / ZHdK

Fadenbild, Frauen im Fluss, 1968, Entwurf/Ausführung: Luba Krejčí, Donation: Ica Bally-Trevisani
Abbildung: Museum für Gestaltung Zürich / ZHdK

Protokollauszug, Bewilligung des Ankaufs eines Wandbildes von Luba Krejčí, Kunstgewerbemuseum Zürich, 1969
Abbildung: Museum für Gestaltung Zürich / ZHdK

Exhibition text
Textiles: Black and White

Textile techniques have always presented a wide-ranging field for creativity. Whether in applied form as garments or interior furnishings or as free artistic work, textiles have a way of inspiring designers to flights of fancy and the urge to explore the expressive possibilities of the genre. While embroidery develops across an existing support, the lace that emerged out of it during the Italian Renaissance can expand virtually infinitely into space.