Gabriel Kondratiuk. «Curiosity»

3 October → 23 November 2024

They say that we never quite leave the territory that saw us grow up, that it remains forever in our retina, even if we have travelled thousands of kilometres away from it. It is enough to place ourselves in front of the works of Gabriel Kondratiuk (El Bolsón, Argentina, 1969) who has been living and developing his artistic career in Austria for some twenty years, to give an obvious example of this.

Specifically, if we look closely, with the curiosity that the title of the exhibition suggests, at the selection of watercolours that we have prepared in Planta1, we will be able to enter the artist's particular universe, which is nothing more than a delightful reconstruction of the visions and experiences of his Patagonian years.

This selection of watercolours has been compiled after a period of several years in which Gabriel concentrated on producing work independently, reading and visiting exhibitions, nourishing himself with new references, without actively participating in the exhibition circuit.

Trees that are heads, heads composed of wild fruits, wild octopuses that come out of the sea and mimic the mountains, mountains that house Christmas decorations, Christmas decorations that are waves, waves that reach the skies, night skies that hide birds, black birds that talk and look at each other, looks that are lost in abstractions, abstractions that are octopus legs, suckers that are confused with leaves and flowers, flowers that form faces, animal faces hidden behind leaves, leaves that hide tents where humans sleep, humans that scream and have animal heads, animals hidden behind darkness, nights in which long and stylised trees shine, stylised human reflections in lakes, lakes that are seas, seas that are clouds, clouds that are forests and forests in whose thicket men get lost until they disappear.

Gabriel Kondratiuk (El Bolsón, Argentina,1969) 

Halfway between the abstract and an almost spontaneous painting, Kondratiuk's work manifests a contemplative and experiential approach to pictorial space that goes beyond representation. Mountains, trees, landscapes that appear as a space of freedom and expansion.