Jitka Hanzlová has traversed contexts, identities and cultures in a quest for the meaning of belonging that lies at the heart of her images. The photographs in Cotton Rose were taken in the Gifu Prefecture of Japan. Hanzlová strongly resisted the long tradition of travel journals written about Japan, showing a foreign and exotic country. Since Jitka Hanzlová defected from the Communist regime in Czechoslovakia in 1982 she has sought to explore her experiences through photography, producing a body of work at once poetic and truthful. Hanzlová's photography is in constant pursuit of the relationship between the individual and the context in which people live. It scrutinizes the ways in which home and surroundings indelibly shape identity. Drawing on her own life story, Hanzlová's photographs also speak of a more universal longing for a sense of place.
Published by Koenig Books. Preface by John Berger.
In previous series, Czech photographer Jitka Hanzlová (born 1958) has explored the connections between individuals, their identities and their environments. In the body of work collected here, she turns her camera on horses. As art historian Jesus Carrillo Castillo has noted, horses are more familiar as images than as animals--so to recapture the physicality of the horse, and convey something of the visceral experience of being with these animals, Hanzlová zooms in on the details. She moves in close to her subjects, creating intimate color photographs of parts of horses, capturing the essence of these animals in the texture of their eyelashes, the fur on their ears or a piece of grass caught in a long tail. Beautifully produced in an oversized clothbound format, Jitka Hanzlová: Horse features a preface by John Berger.
Published by Walther König, Köln. Introduction by Terézia Mora.
This new selection of images by Czech photographer Jitka Hanzlová (born 1958) captures the eccentricities and characters of the Ruhr region in Northern Germany. Hanzlová's vibrant shots of people and nature alike are tender and empathetic.
Jitka Hanzlová: Horse
Jitka Hanzlová: Hier