About me

Email: Karak6aj@hotmail.com
Mobile: +420 774 86 06 63

Address: Katerina Karaskova, K.H.Borovskeho 965, 393 01 Pelhrimov, Czech Republic.

Personal statement

Painting in developing countries is for me a way to make contact with local people and learn more about their lives, not only from their stories but also through their own pictures. This gives me a great source of inspiration for my own work. I am not only interested in their colourful clothes and exotic faces, but also what is hidden under the surface. The aim of painting is to express my own view of a certain reality and raise public awareness about the problems of the developing world as well as cultural differences.

Studies and Work

I studied law at Charles University in Prague but always wanted to become acquainted with foreign cultures. This is why I have often travelled and worked outside the Czech Republic.

During a 6 month journey across Mexico and Central America in 2003, I got to know a little about the life of people from poorer countries, this has fostered my interest in human rights and development issues.

So after arriving back I went to do a 6 months internships in London at an organisation that supports the development of rights and the status of women around the world. My work was mainly focused on Latin America.

Then I felt keen to gain some more first hand experience of the difficulties indigenous people face in latin America. So I left for Guatemala where I spent the following 6 months working as an international accompanier.

Since February 2006 I have been working as a coordinator of the Ugandan project in Caritas Prague.

Artistic projects

• May – October 2005 – People of Maize (life at Guatemalan countryside 10 years after the end of the civil war) - a series of the portraits and scenes from the Guatemalan countryside

• February – May 2005 – beginning of a several year project Matriarchal cultures around the world in co-operation with an English artists Simon Bird -portraits and scenes from the everyday life of Zapotecs in Tehuantepec (Mexico) and Kuna Indians from the San Blas Islands (Panama)

• March – May 2004 – series of aquarelles of Ancient Egyptian monuments, Mummies and desert countryside of Egypt and Jordan

• March - June 2003 - series of aquarelles focusing on nature and volcanoes of Central America ( Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica)