Artist Spotlight: Ludmila Hrachovinova

“Everything results from something in the past, not coming from nowhere, but rather from something familiar and approachable…” Ludmila talks about the source of her inspiration as something that reminds her of something else past.  A scent, an object, a moment, a certain movement- all of these can trigger her curiosity that leads to a vocabulary of shapes, colours, lines and textures in her drawings and paintings.

The colour palette is always taken from the colours of the reality around her.  Ludmila selects her colours carefully through experimenting with mood boards and sketches before working on larger scale pieces.  She finds it satisfying when she works with the contrasts between vivid colour and that which is blurred.  The varied areas of focus in her work is chosen intuitively, and the aesthetics are a result of her emotions and something in the subconscious that is unintentionally triggered by something around her.

Micro-perspective, human bones, bending of nature, continuation like plants growing, transmission into something else, evolution of things, shapes, corners, tubes, joints, places that bend where two parts connect or come together, all refer back to the body.  She likes the tactile qualities of the materials she draws and paints with.  By pushing, smudging, rubbing, digging, mixing, she tests the limits of expression by the materials to their fullest.

When displaying her paintings and drawings she wants the viewer to have a moment of encounter.  Her paintings are of feelings, of personal experience, and she wants the audience to have a personal experience with her works. The discovery is encouraged by the way she places the works off the wall, either hanging from the ceiling or on a structure which allows the viewer to see it from various angles and from below on ‘mattresses’.  The mattresses are fabrics stitched together with embroidery sown by hand or machine that correlates the shapes and lines of her works as a mirroring of images.  She plays with the position of the works and of the viewer, and encourages interaction.

Pilotenkueche has motivated her to work faster than her normal speed, and for the first time she explores working with pastels, which were on view at the first show at Alte Handelschule.  For the final show, she will continue to work with pastels on paper, and expand to larger works in oil.  How she will display them and what memories we will tap into will only be discovered during the show.

written by mihyun maria kim

Feature image by Charles Park.

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Unfinished Hase

15 Feb – 23 Feb 2019
Alte Handelsschule, Gießerstraße 75, 04229 Leipzig, Germany

Fast Kotzen 

Vernissage:  23.03.19, 19h
Open:  24 – 27.03.19 17h-20h
Location: PILOTENKUECHE, 2nd Floor, Franz-Flemming-Str. 9, 04179 Leipzig, Germany