Opening: 25. 3. 2025, 6 p.m.
Curator: Katarína Nádaská
Exhibition duration: 26. 3. 2025 – 14. 9. 2025
Space Q, Hlavná 27, Košice
The sculptor Alina Ferdinandy (1926 – 1974) was part of the first generation of academically trained female artists and sculptors who enjoyed professional success on the Czechoslovak art scene. She worked primarily in portraiture and monumental sculptures which were implemented on the interiors and exteriors of various public buildings and spaces across Slovakia, but her creative work also included the design of jewellery and plaquettes. The depictions of figures or abstract miniature scenes found in Alina’s art are notable for the distinctive sense of lyricism which the artist discerned in each of her pieces. While Alina remains a somewhat less well-known figure, her work is currently attracting a greater degree of academic attention within a broader art-historical context, and she is gaining an increasingly prominent position within the history of Slovak art.
The exhibition project titled “The Sun Breaks the Ice” introduces the life and work of Alina Ferdinandy through a presentation of surviving artworks placed within the context of the literary legacy of her personal archive. Alina was born in Košice, and although she was based in Bratislava, her work is still a focus of interest for the East Slovak Gallery through its capacity to draw connections between the regional basis of the Gallery’s collection and the wider national context. Her art also sheds light on the cultural and historical intersections in Czechoslovakia from the interwar years up to the period of normalization, the organisation of cultural work in the post-war art scene, and the emergence of the first generation of professional female sculptors as fully-fledged female artists.
Rather than offering an art-historical retrospective of Alina’s work, the exhibition draws instead upon the relatively fragmented legacy of the artist’s personal archive, presenting photographs, films and written texts which elaborate on individual artworks from her oeuvre. Alina’s personal archive is preserved in the form of an extensive collection of documents from her early years to her adulthood, detailing her studies and her wealth of creative work but also offering valuable accounts of her family, her private life and her social and cultural circles.
The exhibition and its accompanying catalogue offer a fuller account of the specific means of artistic expression, working approaches and personal relationships of the artist. The exhibition is divided into three sections (Košice, The Sun Breaks the Ice, The Sculptor AF), each of which uses artworks and archive documents to model a deft image in which the personal circumstances and opinions of the artist intersect with her creative work. This cross-section of Alina’s work combined with biographical details from her life provides an interesting and authentic rare context through which to view the sculptor’s personality, an approach which is made possible through access to her personal archival.
The exhibition project would not have been possible without the professional cooperation and generous support of the art historian Mgr. Denisa Kahounová, to whom we express our sincere gratitude. In addition to showcasing the lyricism of Alina Ferdinandy’s small-scale works against the backdrop of her dramatic life, “The Sun Breaks the Ice” also explores some of the less familiar aspects of the cultural and artistic history of Slovakia.
Expert consultation and contextual advice: Denisa Kahounová, Ľuba Belohradská, Zora Breierová
Expert cooperation: Viera Ballasch Dandárová, Monika Vanečková
Project administration and coordination: Valér Bakajsa, Michal Štofa
Promotion and accompanying events: Viera Ballasch Dandárová, Soňa Stano Jambrichová
Educational programs: Petra Filipiaková, Viera Ballasch Dandárová
Installation and exhibition arrangements: Peter Vrabeľ, Richard Tomory, Adriana Štetiarová
Restoration of works: Mária Kužidlová, Adriana Štetiarová
Graphic design: Jozef Tušan
Translations: Gavin Cowper
Photographic documentation of works: Milan Bobula, Ján Šipӧcz
Sound design: Michal Ballasch
Printed materials: Copyvait s.r.o., Košice
The exhibition was supported by the Art Support Fund and Foundation Proactiva.
