A Matter of Life and Death
November 4 – December 18, 2010
Opening:
Thursday, November 4, 2010, 6-8pm
531 W 25th street, ground floor, #10
New York, NY 10001
Slag Gallery is pleased to present A MATTER OF LIFE AND DEATH, an exhibition of new works by Romanian artist Mircea Suciu.
In these present works, Suciu, as an incessant investigator, deliberately contemplates and insists upon certain aspects of the human condition; human existence unfolding under the sign of an inescapable finitude, and the resulting desperation and absurdity of life, flow together and generate images meant to draw the attention inwards as well as to bring the aesthetic to a predetermined poetic stage.
The exhibition will include 8 of the artist’s recent paintings on canvas.
A pictorial “Death Fugue,” the works in this exhibition combine a variety of references in a contrapuntal design of a fugue with its “memento mori” recapitulation. The works are charged with deep, contemplative significance, exuding powerful artistic commentary in a disquieting voice.
Another notable element is the under painting. Suciu uses the same canvas surface to superimpose several images. The experiment rises in the moment in which the destruction of an image by repeated superimposing of others grows into a novel artistic entity; a relief on the surface, as well as a sort of history of the gesture, a memory of a failed act. In these works, the coloristic climate is tension filled; the hues have crepuscule brilliance.
Suciu notes: “One aspect of my work lies within the draw that I feel towards the expressionism, moreover, towards an understanding fed by a fragile emotional state impacted by history’s tragic side. I am an expressionist artist at the emotional and comprehension level, yet formally and technically I practice a “hybrid” art.
The painted surface sometimes preserves an unfinished aspect, a spontaneous, energetic gesture. I try to finely tune the balance between the figurative and the abstract which underlines a confliction state, a tension, both formal and ideatic.”
SLAG Gallery specializes in contemporary Eastern European and American art and is operated by owner/director Irina Protopopescu.
Mircea Suciu: A MATTER OF LIFE AND DEATH will remain on view through December 18th.
SLAG Gallery is located at 531 W 25th street, ground floor, #10, New York, NY 10001
Hours: Tuesday through Saturday, 11 am to 6 pm.
www.slaggallery.com
For press inquiries and reproductions contact Irina Protopopescu at 917 977 1848.
For general inquiries contact the gallery at 212 967 9818.
*Image above:
Courtesy of Slag Gallery
The artist retains the copyrights.
