Ruzena Zatkova

THE STORY OF A FRIENDSHIP WITH THE CZECH FUTURIST RUZENA ZATKOVA UNEARTHS TWO PREVIOUSLY UNKNOWN WORKS BY THE RUSSIAN ARTIST

The discovery of two original works by Natalia Goncharova is a momentous event. As often happens in such cases, chance played a role. Working on my dissertation, devoted to the Czech artist Ruzena Zatkova, I was trying to find out what could have happened to some of her compositions that were believed to have been lost. Together with Professor Alena Pomajzlova, a Zatkova scholar who has thoroughly studied the Czech artist’s correspondence with Goncharova, I was pursuing a lead that might bring us to their present owners; that journey culminated at a private home, where we found not only Zatkova’s works but two unknown, previously unpublished gouache pieces by Goncharova as well.