Zuzana Chalupová

Contributions to culture and science:

Zuzana Chalupová was one of the most important representatives of naive painting from Kovačica. She mostly painted colorful scenes from everyday life and work in the countryside. She strived to create an optimistic and better world where people with children’s faces are better and happier. Her paintings adorn numerous museums, galleries and private collections. She exhibited everywhere from Europe to the Americas, in Vienna, Paris, Rome and New York. She received the “Cyril and Methodius” decoration for her life’s work, the most significant recognition of the Matica Slovenska from Bratislava for successful Slovaks in the diaspora.

Short biography:

Zuzana was born in 1925 in Kovačica into a poor Slovak family. She attended primary school in Kovačica, where she finished only five grades but excelled at painting. Zuzana married during World War II. It was not until 1948 that she painted her first painting on the wall of a house, using the colors she dissolved in milk. Her painting style was influenced by embroidery, which Zuzana learned in her youth. Only later, in 1964, did she start painting in oil and watercolors. Her work was highly appreciated, and the artist immediately sold most of her first paintings. After her husband died, in1974, as an already established artist, she toured Europe and exhibited in many countries worldwide. She gladly donated the paintings to charity to UNICEF, UNESCO and the Red Cross.

Interesting facts (Storytelling):

She started painting relatively late. The best embroiderer in the village, who invented her own embroidery style, turned into a painter and replaced needles with brushes. She had no children but painted a world full of children, and the representation of a child’s face became the central theme of her work. In 1973, François Mitterrand visited Zuzana in her studio, and then she started cooperating with UNICEF.