LOUISA KRÁTKÁ
Musician / multi-disciplinary artist / activist / art & music educator / bookbinder
VIOLIN / FIDDLE / MUSIC INSTRUCTION
Louisa Krátká (she/her) teaches violin and fiddle privately, online and in-person from her home studio in Guelph, ON, Canada. (See Lessons page for more info)
Louisa attended the Nova Scotia College of Art (Halifax, NS, Canada), where she studied jewellery design, printmaking, textiles and book arts. After graduating with a BFA in 1999, Louisa worked as a children’s arts instructor for two years at the Burlington Arts Centre, teaching a course she designed entitled ‘Sound, Music, Art, Laughing’. Children made home-made musical instruments, listened to many genres of music, learned about the elements and principles of design, played music together and had fun.
After taking many courses in bookbinding, and completing an exchange in her final year of NSCAD at Philadelphia’s University of the Arts, Louisa founded and ran her part-time business, LK Bookbindery, in 2003 until 2018. Its website www.lkbookbindery.ca is no longer functional, but its contents - specifically, photos of custom designed books, artist books and kids creations - are being integrated on this page: Book Arts. For nearly a decade (2008-17), Louisa facilitated bookmaking projects with hundreds of children at many Ontario schools as an Artist in Education, which was made possible with multiple grants from the Ontario Arts Council’s Arts Education program.
This work brought together her interests and experience in bookbinding, drawing, printmaking, calligraphy as well as teaching and community arts. You may listen to Louisa speaking about this venture and chapter in her life, in her interview with an enthusiastic Dan Evans of the radio program ‘Books for Breakfast’ on CFRU’s University of Guelph campus radio. Louisa took part in festivals such as Guelph’s Art on the Street (2008 & 2013), and Grimsby’s Wayzgoose (2013) and OCAD’s Book Arts Fair (2004), and taught book arts workshops at the Guelph School of Art and The Print Studio / Centre3 (Hamilton) and various other venues including backyards and artist studios, including her own shared studio at 490 York Rd in Guelph.
Louisa’s research interests, activism and ideas about the natural and spiritual world
Her past academic research topics include toxics in the visual arts, pollutants, environmental justice and human-driven climate change. Her spiritual interests range from empathy and wisdom from trauma, healthy expression, walking / yoga / dance / movement and inspiration derived from beauty and the natural world.
CONTACT
louisakratka [ at ] gmail [dot] com or by phone
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