Kamil Šlapák: Danger of falling into open depth
We invite you on Tuesday, February 4, 2025 at 6:30 p.m. to the gallery of the P. O. Hviezdoslav Theater in Bratislava, where the exhibition of Kamil Šlapák, a student of the painting Studio 3EAM, is opening, curated by Sandy Minďaš, Fanny Elisabeth Pekarčíková and Hana Ontkocová from the Department of Theory and History of Art at the AFAD.
Where:
-
Gallery at the P. O. Hviezdoslav Theatre
- Laurinská ulica 20, 811 01 Bratislava
When:
-
Opening: 4 February 2025 at 18:30
- Duration of the exhibition: 5 - 28 February 2025
- Available during DPOH performances or every Friday from 12.00 - 13.00.
Please register due to a limited capacity.
Admission is free
Exhibiting artist:
Kamil šlapák
Curator:
Sandy Minďaš
Collaboration:
Hana Ontkocová and Fanny Elisabeth Pekarčíková
Supervisors:
Rastislav Sedlačík/3EAM and Beáta Jablonská
Annotation
Kamil Šlapák's works allude to landscapes and still lifes based on art history in the tradition of painting. He transforms these genres into a form that communicates with the contemporary world and the limits of our vision, and considers how they relate to current ecological and social crises. He observes the connection between man-altered landscapes and organic environments and the connections between birth and destruction. Different layers, relationships and boundaries are intertwined in harmonious wholes that raise a question in the viewer, a kind of uncertainty between what he sees and what he only suspects. There is a play of seeing and not seeing in the paintings that refers to an ever-changing landscape, without fixed boundaries. They move between surface and depth, near and far, man and nature. The compositions exude a certain calm and stillness, but are often disrupted by visual obstacles that introduce uncertainty. Hence the title of the exhibition, The Danger of Falling into Open Depth. It is inspired by signage that is commonly used on construction sites, but within this exhibition it is metaphorical in nature. It is based on the precarious boundaries between what is on the surface and what is hidden in the depths. Danger is not present at first sight, it is not seen, but it is suspected, beneath the surface, beneath the snow, beneath the surface, in the veil of silence.
The author Kamil Šlapák studies at the Department of Painting in the Studio 3EAM (headed by Rastislav Sedlačík) at the Academy of Fine Arts and Design in Bratislava. In his work he interprets reality as a space between physical and symbolic boundaries. He works with a variety of materials and approaches, in each of which the need to increase sensitivity to the landscape is very present. The first approach is precise watercolours, in which, however, he suppresses the typical language of watercolour. His emphasis is on colour, composition, clean surfaces and the capture of light and translucency. The second approach is oil paintings, in which he is more interested in experimenting with the ground, layers and different textures. The most recent are material experiments, such as destroying or etching polystyrene on panels that capture machine tracks in the snow. The paintings respond directly to the space they are in, communicating in a new dialogue, such as the contrast of just polystyrene slabs and snow watercolours with coloured stained glass. Various opposites, also present in Kamil Šlapák's works, meet here; the warming atmosphere is disturbed by cold, frosty unease and uncertainty.
