Opening 26/09/2024, 18:00
Kuzebauch Gallery
27/09/2024 – 22/11/2024
Every artist seeks to develop a distinctive creative voice. But even that is no guarantee of quality. What is critical is for the given artist to be able to create meaningful content rather than just form. In other words, whether the artist gains attention for a mere hollow, meaningless stylisation, or for something deeper with an authentic and organic raison d’être. For sculptor Gizela Šabóková – this year marking 45 years on the scene – mere formalism is an entirely alien concept. This is because each of her works is an attempt to capture real emotions, and to create a record of a creative process anchored to a very specific concept. It is not at all unusual for Šabóková to return to a work again and again, fine-tuning it before she is completely satisfied with the result. The process of craftsmanship can take months or even years before form and content find themselves in harmony and the artist’s intentions to create the intended meaning are fully realised.
Gizela Šabóková is constantly on the move. Despite being an established, internationally recognised artist, her artistic growth and curiosity remain unbounded. The core aesthetic of her works remains, as always, contrasts between surfaces and depths, between light and shade, between economical gestures and an emphasis on detail, as well as an evolving sense of storytelling, formats and technical approaches. The same applies for the key theme of figures. The results invoke someone who has swam around the world, visited every continent on Earth, but still continues to look for whether some unexplored corner remains to be found. Because Šabóková typically works alone in crafting her materials, such physical contact, too, serves as a source of inspiration.
While painters artistically interpret the world before them, sculptors must create new worlds from scratch. Gizela Šabóková has a breathtaking ability to give tangible form to the wellspring of her vast imagination. Her sculptures represent pulsing bodies of energy and are typically from glass – indeed, this exhibition introduces papers that utilise a deep cut and sandblasting. Moreover, an evident tension between the surface and that which is found beneath evokes a very tangible sense of magic. Šabóková’s works ultimately represent artefacts that stand outside standard concepts of time and space. A kind of corporeal manifestation of the “Music of the Spheres”.
Petr Nový, curator
