Facelift showcases the work of three prominent contemporary Czech and Slovakian women artists: Lucie Nimcová, photojournalist; Alena Kotzmannová, photographer and installation artist; and Kateřina Šedá, video artist. Conveying the new “globalized” atmosphere, the artists address personal and political changes in their native Czech and Slovakian Republics. Alena Kotzmannová’s Station to Station, propels us back in time, presenting a distinctly post-soviet landscape, while Lucie Nimcová’s photographs depict Czech and Slovakian women remodeling themselves based on modern and western norms, with both sad and humorous results. In Kateřina Šedá’s _NIC TAM NENÍ (There Is Nothing)), a project that includes 300 small village inhabitants, the villagers at first seem connected only by their common claim that “nothing happens”. In response to the sense of decay in their community, Šedá creates a game which synchronizes the villagers’ daily routines so that everyone does exactly the same things at exactly the same time, renewing the villager’s sense of unity.

Kotzmannová, Nimcová and Šedá each question what is now considered “normal” in the Czech and Slovak Republics and confront the precarious balance between having a strong cultural and national identity while also identifying with the global community. Facelift weaves these poignant and specific cultural questions through today’s broader global challenges.