Exhibitions, Italy, Firenze, 07 March 2019
Špela Volčič
ET FIAT LUX
Opening: March 7, 6pm
SACI Gallery, Via Sant’Antonino, 11 – Florence
Artist Talk: March 9, 6pm
Dryphoto Arte contemporanea, Via delle Segherie, 33 – Prato
In collaboration with: Slovenian Embassy in Rome, Dryphoto Arte contemporanea, Prato
Volčič’s research is focused on the tension between reality and fiction, visible and invisible, true and false. Trained as a photographer, her research has grown to include multiple media, ranging from video to object, drawings, sculptures and installations. Volčič often investigates the sculptural practice in its form as installation art, transforming materials through the acts of folding (flowers) and baking (bread). In these processes, photography becomes a tool and the final work.
The pictures of the project Et Fiat Lux feature simulacra, perfect imitations of real flowers.
The project involves the folding of over two hundred flowers into ikebans. The meticulous compositions also echo the aesthetics of Dutch Baroque still life paintings (nature morte) from the seventeenth century, producing an initially familiar image for the viewer that actually stems from a carefully built trans-historical and trans-cultural configuration.
The first part of the project (Et at Lux) is made by 9 photographs inspired by baroque still life paintings. The second part of the project (Untitled, Tesla) is a photographic installation and uncovers to the viewer the process of the ikebana making in the artist’s studio. The third part (After Et Fiat Lux) is a photographic series which includes photos are taken with the tungsten film and the same ikebana are composed just with the vegetal bushes (without flowers) resulting in images that are animated by a colorful glow, creating the illusion of a flower.
The subject and the result of the work rely on its ambiguity: the bouquets appear to be composed of real fresh flowers from afar, and only by getting closer it is possible to notice that they are fake. Light becomes the source of action in Volčič’s work: the principle of the movement is able to reveal the hoax where an archetypical example of beauty is constructed with plastic materials, or it makes visible an image that does not really exist.
Špela Volčič (b. Postojna, 1984) is a visual artist based in Slovenia and Italy. After studying photography in Ljubljana, in 2004 she moved to Milan where she obtained a Diploma in Techniques and Languages of the Contemporary Photographic Project at CFP Riccardo Bauer. In 2011 she won a scholarship assigned by the Ministry of Culture in Slovenia that allowed her to continue her studies at the IUAV University of Venice, where she graduated in Visual Arts in 2013. After completing her studies, she was granted a one year artist- residency in Venice at the contemporary art foundation Bevilacqua La Masa, and she was later selected for a residence at VIR - Viafarini DOCVA in Milan, Italy. Since 2016 she is officially registered as a freelancer in a field of culture assigned at the Slovenian Ministry of Culture of Republic Slovenia.
ET FIAT LUX
Opening: March 7, 6pm
SACI Gallery, Via Sant’Antonino, 11 – Florence
Artist Talk: March 9, 6pm
Dryphoto Arte contemporanea, Via delle Segherie, 33 – Prato
In collaboration with: Slovenian Embassy in Rome, Dryphoto Arte contemporanea, Prato
Volčič’s research is focused on the tension between reality and fiction, visible and invisible, true and false. Trained as a photographer, her research has grown to include multiple media, ranging from video to object, drawings, sculptures and installations. Volčič often investigates the sculptural practice in its form as installation art, transforming materials through the acts of folding (flowers) and baking (bread). In these processes, photography becomes a tool and the final work.
The pictures of the project Et Fiat Lux feature simulacra, perfect imitations of real flowers.
The project involves the folding of over two hundred flowers into ikebans. The meticulous compositions also echo the aesthetics of Dutch Baroque still life paintings (nature morte) from the seventeenth century, producing an initially familiar image for the viewer that actually stems from a carefully built trans-historical and trans-cultural configuration.
The first part of the project (Et at Lux) is made by 9 photographs inspired by baroque still life paintings. The second part of the project (Untitled, Tesla) is a photographic installation and uncovers to the viewer the process of the ikebana making in the artist’s studio. The third part (After Et Fiat Lux) is a photographic series which includes photos are taken with the tungsten film and the same ikebana are composed just with the vegetal bushes (without flowers) resulting in images that are animated by a colorful glow, creating the illusion of a flower.
The subject and the result of the work rely on its ambiguity: the bouquets appear to be composed of real fresh flowers from afar, and only by getting closer it is possible to notice that they are fake. Light becomes the source of action in Volčič’s work: the principle of the movement is able to reveal the hoax where an archetypical example of beauty is constructed with plastic materials, or it makes visible an image that does not really exist.
Špela Volčič (b. Postojna, 1984) is a visual artist based in Slovenia and Italy. After studying photography in Ljubljana, in 2004 she moved to Milan where she obtained a Diploma in Techniques and Languages of the Contemporary Photographic Project at CFP Riccardo Bauer. In 2011 she won a scholarship assigned by the Ministry of Culture in Slovenia that allowed her to continue her studies at the IUAV University of Venice, where she graduated in Visual Arts in 2013. After completing her studies, she was granted a one year artist- residency in Venice at the contemporary art foundation Bevilacqua La Masa, and she was later selected for a residence at VIR - Viafarini DOCVA in Milan, Italy. Since 2016 she is officially registered as a freelancer in a field of culture assigned at the Slovenian Ministry of Culture of Republic Slovenia.
Comments 0
Say something