‘I was compelled to drive the blade into the canvas’: The artist Edita Schubert used her surgical blade like creatives handle a paintbrush.

Edita Schubert lived a double life. For more than three decades, the artist from Croatia held a position at the Institute of Anatomy at the Zagreb University’s faculty of medicine, precisely illustrating dissected human bodies for medical reference books. In her private atelier, she created work that defied simple classification – frequently employing the identical instruments.

“She created these highly accurate, technical drawings which were used in surgical handbooks,” notes a organizer of a fresh exhibition of her artistic output. “She was right in the middle of that practice … She was entirely comfortable in the dissection room.” These detailed anatomical studies, observes a exhibition curator, are still featured in manuals for surgical trainees currently in Croatia.

Where Two Realms Converged

Schubert’s dual vocation wasn’t unusual for Yugoslav artists, who seldom could rely on art sales. However, the manner in which these spheres merged was unique. The medical knives for anatomical dissection became instruments for slicing canvas. Adhesive tape intended for bandages held her perforated artworks together. The test tubes typically reserved for laboratory samples evolved into receptacles for her personal history.

A Frustration That Cut Deep

In the early 1970s, Schubert was still working within the confines of traditional painting. Her work included detailed, photorealistic compositions in paints and mediums of candies and condiment containers. Yet, irritation had been festering since her training. During her time at the Zagreb art school, she was required to depict nude figures. “I was compelled to stab the knife through the fabric, it truly frustrated me, that taut surface on which I had to talk about something,” she confided in a researcher, in a seldom-granted conversation. “I used the knife to pierce the canvas, not a paintbrush.”

Where Anatomical Practice Meets Creation

That year, this desire became a concrete action. She made eleven big pieces. All were rendered in a uniform blue hue then using an anatomical scalpel and making hundreds of deliberate, precise cuts. Afterwards, she peeled back the severed canvas to expose the underside, fashioning artworks catalogued with scientific detail. Marking each with a date highlighted their status as performances. In one 1977 series of photographs, entitled Self-Portrait Behind a Perforated Canvas, she inserted her features, hair, and digits through the openings, turning her own body into artistic material.

“Indeed, my entire oeuvre carries a sense of dissection … dissection akin to a life study,” Schubert answered regarding the works' significance. According to a trusted associate and academic, this statement was illuminating – a clue from an artist who rarely explained herself.

Separate Careers, Intertwined Roots

Analysts frequently presented her twin professions as wholly divided: the pioneering creator in one sphere, the technical draftsman funding her life in the other. “My perspective is that those two personalities were deeply, deeply connected,” notes a close friend. “It's impossible to spend 35 years at the Anatomy Institute from eight in the morning until three in the afternoon and remain untouched by the environment.”

Anatomical Echoes in Geometric Shapes

A key insight from a ongoing display is how it maps these clinical themes within creations that superficially look completely abstract. During the middle of the 1980s, she made a collection of angular works – trapeziums, as they came to be known. Contemporary critics categorized them under the trendy neo-geo label. But the truth was discovered only years later, when cataloguing Schubert’s estate.

“I inquired, how are these shapes created?” remembers a scholar. “Her response was straightforward: it's a human face.” The distinctive hues – what colleagues called “Schubert red” and “Schubert blue” – were identical tints used for drawing neck vasculature in anatomy books in a manual for surgical anatomy utilized in medical faculties across Europe. “I realised that those two colours appeared at the same time,” the account notes. The geometric abstractions were, in fact, highly stylised human bodies – painted while she worked on anatomical illustrations by day.

Shifting to Natural Materials

During the transition into the 1980s, her creative approach changed once more. She initiated works using wood lashed with straps. She arranged collections of bone, petals, spices and ash on floors. Questioned about the move to natural substances, the artist stated that contemporary art had “dried up intellectually”. She felt compelled to transgress – to utilize genuinely perishable matter as a response to art that had metaphorically withered.

One work from 1979, 100 Roses, featured her denuding a century of flowers. She braided the stems into round arrangements positioning the floral remnants in the center. When encountered during exhibition preparation, it still held its power – the organic matter now fully desiccated but miraculously intact. “The aroma remains,” one observer marvels. “The colour is still there.”

The Artist of Mystery

“My aim is to remain enigmatic, to conceal my process,” she revealed in terminal-year interviews. Mystery was her method. On occasion, she displayed counterfeit pieces concealing genuine artworks beneath her bed. She eliminated select sketches, keeping merely autographed copies. Although she participated in global art events and gaining recognition as a trailblazer, she granted virtually no press access and her output stayed mostly obscure internationally. A present retrospective marks her first significant external showcase.

Responding to the Horrors of Conflict

Subsequently, the nineties dawned with the outbreak of conflict. Violence reached Zagreb itself. The artist answered with a group of mixed-media works. She adhered press images and headlines onto panels. She duplicated and expanded them. Then she obscured the surface with paint – dark stripes akin to product codes. {Geometric forms obscured the images beneath|Angular shapes hid the pictures below|