Julie Daňhelová’s black and white drawings balance between historical documents and imaginative imagery. Her work is framed with custom-made frames, often decorated with original carvings. She also creates in-situ installations of objects that evoke alchemical experiments or rituals. Her drawings, created with a thin graphite pencil on handmade paper, fascinate with their perfection. Although they may appear to require extensive preparation, their precision and regularity come from intense concentration – from a meditative state of mind where thought, hand, and paper become one. The drawing itself leads the way, resulting in mysterious environments full of details and encrypted meanings. The scenes may resemble hermetic images that convey deep understanding. The spread of consciousness is heightened by the artist’s use of paper; although fragile, it has been used since ancient times as a tool for civilizations to leave their imprint on history.
Stories from the Ore Mountains tell of how people have tamed the landscape, but also how the landscape subtly shapes human lives. From the 16th century, the Ore Mountains experienced a period of mining fever. People from all over Europe – Venetians, Saxons, Czechs – were drawn to the region by the vision of wealth hidden in the depths of the earth. Everything that was
