07/06/2026
THE FAVORITES
MARIA BARTUSZOVA sculptor, Slovakia
1936-1996
“Maria Bartuszová developed a distinctive sculptural language that was guided by her own pioneering methods of casting plaster...During the 1960s, Bartuszová conceived the technique of gravistimulated modelling which guided the conceptual framework of her early sculptures...The artist later considered the physical qualities of air and water when she began experimenting with pneumatic casting in the 1980s.” [alisonjacques.com]
“Plaster, wire and string were central to her process, provoking sensations in the viewer of pain and pleasure, exclusion and protection. Echoes of breasts and bellies are often summoned, sometimes in arrangements that accentuate their fullness. Other compositions have a different sensuality, weighing down, even interleaving, curving plaster forms with less tractable materials – stone, wood, rubber – as a way of suggesting the sometimes painful play between hard and soft.”
[Anne Wagner, www.lrb.co.uk]
+ She made sculptures intended to be held and touched that have been used as tools in workshops for blind children.
photo credits : 1. Folded Figure, Haptic 1974 [The Archive of Maria Bartuszová/Museum der Moderne Salzburg]
2. Folded Figure, Horizontal, Haptic 1974 [The Archive of Maria Bartuszová/Tate Modern]
3. Untitled, 1973 [Alison Jacques/Tate Modern]
4. Untitled, 1982 [alisonjacques.com]
5. [Archives of Women Artists AWARE]
6. [www.villazan.com]
7. [www.mariabartuszova.com]
