Life is the greatest mystery in the world and humanity has been trying to solve it since the very beginning of our existence through a variety of myths and religions. Today, with all the newest technological achievements and scientific knowledge at our disposal, we are closest to the understanding of life’s origin ever. We can observe its formation through microscopes and even create it artificially with the help of genetic engineering. However, the grandiosity of this phenomena still mesmerizes us as it is difficult to comprehend, how brain/feelings/soul and other elements of our identity evolve just from one tiny cell.
Subject
Gheorghe Virtosu’s piece is the celebration of the enigma of life, which can’t be overshadowed by any rational scientific explanations.
The contemporary artist is trying to capture the permanent cycle of renewal, which is the fundamental rule of existence.
From a physiological perspective, we are a continuously self-regenerating organism. And even when those processes are slowed down with age and are finally stopped by death, we still find the continuation in our off-springs. We occur to be the source of life ourselves, having gametes - the reproductive cells from which a fetus is developed. Flesh produces flesh.
Color, Tonality, Rhythm
Gametes have two types – female and male. Thus, life is inherently the unity of female and male. The abstract painter represents this notion through the congruous combination of the curvilinear kidney-like forms, which are traditionally associated with femininity, and more edgy ‘masculine’ lines that remind of the heart-rate pattern on the cardiogram.
Their unity is arranged into the silhouette of an embryo untied with the rest of the image with a sort of an ‘umbilical cord’ - the finalizing horizontal stroke.
The nascent warmth of life is expressed through the pulsating yellow tints, enhanced by the inclusion of turquoise, dark blue, and red. Those inlays of color look like gems on the golden framing, giving the composition the sublime tonality. The rhythm of the figure is underlined by the conflicting rendering of the background: it is done in wide vertical and horizontal strokes that form the grid. The grid is the visualization of the intrinsic structure of any art piece regardless of its subject, the skeleton, which gives the order to the painterly Chaos.
Body
The substance of paint is turned into Body - in the process of becoming. The large format of the canvas doesn’t allow us to embrace it at once, so the viewer has to ‘pulp’ the surface of the canvas centimeter by centimeter.
Our vision becomes the instrument in the artist’s hands.
Curiously, the eye lens is the only part of human’s organism that doesn’t renew itself. It remains with us since the first day of our birth. Isn’t that symbolic the only permanent element of our body helps us perceiving beauty? And showing it’s probably art and culture that can help us to find some constancy in the ever-changing and evolving world. Because, as Khalil Gibran wrote, “Beauty is eternity gazing at itself in a mirror.”
About author
Alexandra Osadkova was born 1984 in Kiev, Ukraine. She studied at National Academy of Visual Arts and Architecture, Kiev. Educated in Ukraine and the US. Lives in Los Angeles. Exhibition Designer, Writer. E:This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
