Lucie Svobodová focuses on the creation of works with intermedia overlaps. She has long used computer animation, which she began experimenting with in the 1980s and 1990s, as one of her key means of expression. Her innovatory approach, along with her experimental work with camera, led her to become one of the original members of the Obor videa / Video Section (founded in 1988), the first official platform of Czech video art under the Union of Czechoslovak Visual Artists. Over the next few years she focused on other innovative technologies, especially the Internet, 3D graphics, virtual reality and artificial intelligence.
Though Svobodová originally focused on traditional painting techniques, during her studies at the Academy of Arts, Architecture and Design in Prague she gradually began to shift her attention to the possibilities of the moving image. Her first works, created on an Amiga Commodore computer, were limited by the capacity of the device, though nevertheless possessed a distinctive style and multiple layers of meaning. These animations often examined the cycle of life and the question of individual knowledge, subject matter prompted by the artist’s interest in East Asian forms of spirituality (Obrázky / Images, 1989; Backgrounds, 1990).
An important feature of these early works was the derivation of individual digital images from hand-drawn or painted models, a process that Svobodová systematically varied in the years to come. Her pilot 3D animations were no exception in this respect, for the production of which she began using a Silicon Graphics computer and the graphic programs Unix and Wavefront in 1991. Standout films in this respect include the short animation Cesta / The Journey (1993), first presented at the exhibition of the same name at Prague’s Radost FX Gallery, and the works Vteřina za vteřinou / Second by Second (1994) and Moře / The Sea (1995), which draw on the artist’s experiences with psychedelics.
Svobodová subsequently developed the supporting elements of these works in her experimental project Nebe, peklo, ráj / Heaven, Hell, Paradise (1995–1996), which was an important step on her journey from simple videos to complex installations. This virtual reality, presented at the seminal exhibition Orbis Fictus (Wallenstein Riding School, Prague 1995), was the result of a collaboration with specialists in the spheres of programming and neurology, making it possible to interact with the work through her own brain waves. The illusory situations therefore depended for the most part on the mental settings of the participant, who through their connections influenced whether the virtual space would be dominated by positive or negative emotions.
During the 1990s, Svobodová was involved in musical collaborations, culminating in 1998 with the release of her own solo album Aurobora. In addition to songs, this included a separate CD containing, for example, videos and interactive games, something that confirmed the artist’s interest in simultaneous work with different genres and methods. At the end of that decade, Svobodová was also taking an interest in the newly emerging possibilities of Internet interfaces, something to be seen in the experimentally programmed Auropla.net (2000). This is a virtual space that allowed the avatars present to communicate with each other via an integrated 3D chat.
After 2000, Svobodová continued to explore these principles with the incorporation into her work of laser (Yonisféra, 2000), stereoscopic projection (Interspace 12, 2005) and bio-art (Transgenesis, 2007). One of her most technologically demanding works was an interactive installation from the Czech pavilion at the World Expo 2010 in Shaghai, on which she collaborated with audiovisual specialist Roman Dušek and programmer Jan Matas. The project represented the space of a phantasmal microcosm, within which the visitor could transform into an avatar in the form of a virus or microbe. Thanks to this modified position, they could then walk around the constructed whole in a state of weightlessness and establish fictitious contacts with gradually appearing bodies.
In addition to installations and other spatial projects, Svobodová has long been involved in digital graphics, which she creates by combing various algorithmic series. One of the most striking examples of this is Růže / Rose, which won a prize in the competition Graphics of the Year 2008. This sophisticated work not only developed an original biomorphic abstraction, but also reflected the artist’s notion of infinite atmospheric space based on her deep relationship with the exact sciences.
Leaving aside the works that reveal a fascination with technology and scientific knowledge, we can also trace a more introspective line in Svobodová’s work, the core of which resides in an effort to capture the complexity of human experience. Over the course of her career, this inclination has resulted in intimate works exploring the potential of magic and the power of the feminine principle (Nepíchej a píchej / Don’t Fuck and Fuck, 1999), as well as interactive installations that, through targeted aestheticisation, pose questions relating to the intimate feelings and desire of the viewer (Nejasný předmět touhy / The Unclear Object of Desire, 2014).
Another feature of Svobodová’s output during the last decade involves various forms of intervention, either in the public or gallery space. The first case would include the creation of the light and sound sculpture Sochy bohyně Diany / Sculpture of the Goddess Diana (2016), which was intended to make visible and fill the empty space left by the stolen original by František Rous. Another significant achievement in this respect was her solo exhibition at the National Gallery in Prague (Maxwellova rovnice / Maxwell’s Equation, 2014), in which she confronted paintings from the first half of the 20th century with her own contemporary paintings and a multimedia installation. The final form of these works was always dependent upon complicated mathematical formulas and calculations that Svobodová generated through computer programs. In this way she not only created works that find a position for themselves within the range of her oeuvre as referenced above, but also demonstrated her ability to navigate techniques and technologies that are among the most progressive in the art world.
