Alenka Koderman: A description of my painting (1996-2010)

Description of my painting 1996 – 2010

In all these years of my practise of painting I wanted to expose a certain problem. If I look back, there is an evidence of explicating the memory of a specific space and searching for crucial points, which describe that place and which have emerged from my experience, aesthetic sensations and reception. The painting for my bachelor’s degree have actually been created due to persistent exploration of the paths in the woods, fragmenting of the penetrating light, the changing of the seasons, changes of the weather condition, macrocosm and microcosm of the forest landscape and the study of different floras.

The woods itself was the beginning of a new path towards the painting, and at the same time also the starting point of my own poetics, not just in the sense of expression but also as revelation of the spectre of the perception. This spectre functioned – in a way – as a platform and oasis of ideas, even some kind of inspiring catapult, yet the paintings have never been so close to mere reproducing or copying of the real. My work was mostly based on photographs which have served as a “refreshment” of the perceived reality. In my opinion, the picture becomes a picture when it separates self from the real object, when we do not picture the visible in front of our eyes – for example, when we paint in nature –, but rather when we feel that the painting is a part of her original space, whereas the objectified space is not correlated to the real, yet the painting bears its being and spatial characteristics.

Later on, my works tend to grasp the whole landscape, and besides the vibrant light and the water substance as well, I have incorporated in my work also the attempt to express the flexibility of the tree branches, leaves, and grass.

The pastureland with its inner life, such as is the rustle movement of the blades of the grass, is being observed from different loci, mostly hillsides of the woods and the immediate proximity of the lakes (like the Cerkniško lake) and rivers. Meanwhile, the painted motifs are not just representing themselves: they depict also the language of the understanding of the world, either the circumstances, the inclusion of an individual to the society, inter-dependence and the values which root in such relations. In the arts, especially within the painting, I would focus on every little detail which is a part the whole – through the same analogy I understand the individual who is an indispensable and therefore an essential part of the society. I believe that our relation towards the world also reflects in our attitude

towards art-work, especially toward the artist’s understanding of the world, society, relationships and ethical principles – everything is imbued within the picture.

Grass, often depicted in my art-works (period 2002 – 2006), represents also the revolt, as it always defies the weather, but at the same time it also represents the persistence – even if the people walk on the grass, it always grows back.

In spite of all existential crisis that accompany the artist through his or her creative work, in spite of failure, rejections by the galleries and the critics, all this is necessary for artist’s reestablishment to the reality, and his/her gaining the appropriate knowledge about different life situations and stronger backbone which helps the artist to overcome the problems and to persist. In the late years (2007 and onwards), the sea has become the most frequent motif. The “peeling” of the real is also present in the sea pictures. During the process of the painting the sea, the space begins to merge with the painting. For me, this is the beginning of the painting’s creation: from the abstract, yet incomprehensible fundament, indistinguishable colour and its elusiveness, the sequences of the light, dynamism of the outlines and the fluctuation of the water, till the vivid emanation, created by juxtaposed layers.

The last pictures are opposite to the photographed pictures, which is a still record. In contrast, I was interested in the very phenomenon of the sea movement, stream, the tension of water drops, the breeze of the wind that is “drawing” unto the sea surface, and thus changes the lighting, waves and splashes. In short, everything that is impossible to conserve within the photo, even though you can impose certain effect, however, it is an indirect and a different kind of media. The digital photo-cameras are also problematic, which tend to reduce the real with its preconfigured colour crossings.

Therefore, the paintings have been created on basis of numerous observations and analysis of the movement, the colour constellations during the day and night, but at the same time, the paintings are the manifestations of continuity of the optics and of widened viewing angle.

The painting is, the way I see it, a thorough process of learning, in which one can experience the process of transformations in the field of optical sensibility, sensual and mental functions, and ability of reception as well. The last pieces of work are the attempts of letting me go to the memory, i. e. to a particular fragment of memory, which

illuminates the cognition. These very cognitions are like a thrust of the motive force, but the paintings are also left to spontaneity, like an individual to the life: you let yourself to the stream.

In a way, there is a similarity between life and painting: you just let the active energy and concentration take you.

And yet I realize that the time here plays its big part: there is nothing you can skip or leave out.

Alenka Koderman, January 2010