Large Fastener I (Scattered)
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- Large Fastener I (Scattered)
- Velké spínadlo I (Rozházené)
- 1971
- assemblage of snap fasteners on cardboard
- 73 × 71 cm
Běla Kolářová, in a way similar to that of her husband, Jiří Kolář, worked intuitively with grid-like structures, manipulating basic geometric outlines of surfaces with an eye to balancing and deconstructing the systems at hand. Even in her initial assemblages (1964–1966), she arranged identical components in regular structures—and the details of such arrangements are enormously entertaining, spellbinding: they can be read as metaphorical statements about interpersonal relationships. Looking back on these assemblages from a present-day vantage point, they also seem possessed of a male-female principle that, incidentally, was affirmed word-for-word later on (during the late ’60s and early ’70s) by some of the artist’s diptychs showing "Velká spínadla" [Large Pushbuttons] with the subtitle "Muž – žena" [Man – Woman]. Her assemblages of little hooks and eyes as well as snap fasteners from 1964 evoke obvious and straightforward anatomical associations, and they alternate between peaceful coexistence of both elements and dynamic clashes that could be read as emblematic of generally existing tensions between both human sexes as well as in the more personal context of two distinctive personalities’ cohabitation. M.Kl.