Former exhibition
The Mysticism of the Everyday – Images by Vlad Safronov
Wlad Safronow lives and works in Augsburg (http://wlad-safronow.com).
The works by Vlad Safronov shown here are images from the exhibitions Encyclopaedia, Mysticism of the Everyday, Vivariumand Secession.
Further exhibitions by the artist can be found here.
CV:
Born on May 13, 1965, in Kharkiv, Ukraine.
From 1984 to 1990, studied at the Academy of Art and Design in Kharkiv.
1990 to 1994, was a lecturer at the Faculty of Painting
and Graphics in Kharkiv;
an expert at the Nella Gallery in Kharkiv;
and led the artists' group "ART-BAT."
Since 1995, has taught painting and drawing in
Germany, currently as a lecturer
at the ART Z art workshop in Augsburg,
and at the University and Artists' Guild in Ulm.
A freelance artist since 1997,
he resigned from the BBK (Professional Association of Visual Artists) in 2012.
About Vlad Safronov
Exhibition “Mysticism of the Everyday”:
No casual art connoisseur's glance can disguise Safronow's paintings as mere, richly varied decorative objects defined solely by stylistic peculiarities and subtleties.
The true art lover will recognize that far more is concealed in the painter's works than can be grasped with the naked eye – it is an impulse, an intuitive understanding, that flows through the viewer as soon as they embark on the path of discovery offered to them.
Each painting is like a vortex, drawing the viewer into the artist's unique, multifaceted world, inviting them to look beyond the forms and decorative embellishments and to embark on a journey of ever-renewed discovery.
Instinctively, one searches for silent messages, for some deeply hidden truths that the artist may have secretly wanted to convey through the symbols and letter prints concealed within the image. However, one very quickly begins to understand that this technique, coupled with the soft, lyrical, sometimes bold use of color, as well as the archaically modern figures or objects, is far more than simply the reproduction of the artist's most intimate emotions.
The painter's feelings, thoughts, impressions, and insights are reflected, coalescing into a structured, individual pattern and resulting in an almost mystical unity.
Each painting is a captivating puzzle for one's own inner world, a construct of a metaphysical nature in which the painter celebrates his freedom and "infects" us with it.
The sculptural structure of the clothing and object surfaces serves to create an optical three-dimensionality and reveals itself to the viewer as a new experiential reality, a pictorial reality that merges into the viewer's own reality.
The "mysticism of the everyday" is an invitation, a call to recognition, to looking behind the facade, and ultimately to the simple enjoyment of authentic art.
By Catherine Lamarr
It is impossible to view Vladislav Safronov's paintings with a cursory glance. They seem to be impulses that the painter sends to the viewer.
It is difficult to escape their pull.
Safronov works "across time," creating his own coordinate system for artistic realism, symbolism, and naive art. He possesses a freedom that can only be bestowed by innate talent.
Many of Safronov's works contain an element of intrigue. At first glance, everything seems familiar. But very soon, one understands that a complex meaning lies hidden behind the depiction, and it is necessary to grasp this meaning and notice the novelty present in the painting.
Sometimes, ironic undertones can be felt in Safronov's paintings. It seems as if he is joking with his subjects. But this is one of his methods of revealing their inner world.
It is also impossible not to notice the careful and unobtrusive use of color in Safronov's paintings. He succeeds in creating a soft, lyrical color palette that speaks from the wall like gentle flute notes. Sometimes, carmine glows in the paintings like the red snow of a melon, like a poppy leaf. Or the brown of a chestnut blossom with a hint of amber within.
The words of Henri Matisse come to mind: "I want to express all my feelings through color."
Vladislav Safronov manages to imprint our thoughts and emotions with the help of brush and paint, and return them to us, transforming them in his consciousness and giving them sharp forms. This opens them up to us on a different level. The master reflects on passion and melancholy, on the transient and the eternal, on good and evil. Even in a completely abstract style of representation, a story about the artist himself, about his inner world, which can never be hidden behind form, however subtle it may be, is contained within it.
By T. Dmitrieva, art critic
To speak about Safronov's paintings will
be a journey into a world of experience, a reality of experience—
sometimes even my own.
For the viewer is simultaneously in one world and another: the world of the painting that encompasses them, and their own world, from which the painting is viewed.
The difference between self and other is crucial
for perceiving one's own and other cultures.
For this, it seems to me, is the central theme of Safronov's paintings.
Standing before them, one gets the impression
that the paintings reach out from reality into actuality.
In contrast to most paintings, which usually leave the viewer with a two-dimensional impression, Safronov's paintings appear three-dimensional.
They invite the viewer to touch the painting. And it seems that only in this touch
is the boundary between object and subject dissolved. The reality of the painting merges into that of the viewer,
the reality of the viewer into the painting.
One could say that Safronov is a metaphysician,
but one who does not locate the transcendent in an unexperienceable beyond, but rather in an intermediate space between image and viewer—an intermediate space, of course,
that requires communication—
between ME and OTHERS.
What shall we call this intermediate space:
Realistic Realism, Magical Realism,
Immanent Transcendence?
by Grabat Milosz
