Artists: Jan Ková?ík, Jan Soumar
Title: The Impermanence of Being
Curator: Michal Stolárik
Venue: Pradiare?, Bratislava, Slovakia
Photography: Isonative
Physical cases break up into clusters of expressive elements flying across dimensions. Stable and concrete becomes dynamic and abstract. Uncontrolled bubbling sets into solid shapes, and endless experiments materialise into imaginative objects of indistinct purpose and origin. Forms, structures or states change, develop and transform. They lie with their bodies, imitate and appropriate their surroundings. They are close to organic shapes and nature; yet, with one foot, they also exist in the spaces of digitisation and technology. Everything changes and nothing lasts forever.
The exhibition The Impermanence of Being represents the first collaboration between Czech authors Jan Ková?ík and Jan Soumar. It follows the dialogue between surface and space, figurative narrative and abstraction, or painting and object. Though each of the two visual artists work with different media and use different approaches, they converge in the ideas of transformation and are inspired by natural elements. Both are close to visual expression that is not loud, yet attracts attention. Continuous metamorphoses communicate directly – on a material or visual level, whilst also responding to symbolic transformations that move the works to more universal and associative levels. Penetration of the distinctive author’s programmes also arises in the depiction of movement or continuous development.
On the one hand, we detect glimpses of figures or the remains of the tangible world in a kind of airy vortices caught in hints of natural scenery. On the other hand, continuous transformation embodied in solid structures ensues, frozen in a unique moment. The inimitable union of the authors highlights the principles of vital development, change and movement, being a tribute to nature and freedom. It communicates the possibilities of psychological action of forms triggering imaginative processes.
The distinctive artistic expression of the Czech sculptor Jan Ková?ík is a combination of different technological methods, experiments, as well as a result of chance. His original new creations are bound to draw attention. Yet, the process of creation matters in itself, when the traditional sculptural craft is combined with unconventional experimentations from other disciplines. Ková?ík alternates perfectly clean and minimalist shapes with organic and raw structures. He works with laminates, artificial stone, acrystal, epoxy, along with plaster, or with found material and recycled waste. He complements the resultant forms with colour and drawing, thus supporting or, on the contrary, imitating the structures and textures of the surfaces. It is sometimes impossible to understand the principles, materials or shapes: he thus inspires a haptic experience. The selection presents Ková?ík’s varied morphologies, as well as the typology of sculptures, whilst focusing on free-standing and hanging works.
In his latest works, the Czech painter Jan Soumar continues to break down figural compositions, which he embeds in hints of non-specific natural scenery or simple coloured surfaces. On oil and acrylic canvases, he offers body fragments created by gestural brushstrokes. He alternates relaxed handwriting with realistic parts, thereby achieving a dreamy, at times romantic atmosphere anchored in dynamic movement. The gradual visual defragmentation brings about a thin border between abstract and figurative painting that lends space for one’s own analysis and interpretations.