Certified graphic print, 50 x 65 cm. Numbered, certificate, handmade Star Museum paper. Signed lower right Toyen. Blind-embossed stamp: Shakespeare Arts LTD. The number of the specific graphic print may differ from the image shown.
About the author:
Toyen, born Marie Čermínová (1902 – 1980), was a Czech painter and graphic artist, one of the most significant figures in Czech surrealism – although she lived most of her life in Paris. She was an independent and distinctive artist and woman in both Czech and international 20th-century art. She defied societal conventions with her bohemian life, and her work stood against philistinism and hypocrisy in art and society. She refused to accept the then-prevailing concept of the female role and saw herself as equal to men, not only in her art but also in her personal life. Her work is characterized by originality and precise execution. Her lifelong friendship with the painter, writer, and photographer Jindřich Štyrský became very important to her. Together, they joined the avant-garde association of the young Czech generation, the Umělecký svaz Devětsil.
Toyen lived for her work; avant-garde art was a means for her to break free from the conventions of life at that time. She was also an independent personality in her perception of sexuality, which she approached very openly and unusually. She began painting her erotic drawings and paintings in the second half of the 1920s, when Czech society considered such art to be decadent pornography.
