Stano Masár

MALEVICH´S FLOOR

opening  September 22 / 2017 / 18:00
September 23 – October 10 / 2017
curator  Mira Sikorová-Putišová
architect of the exhibition Anton Čierny
design Pavlína Fichta Čierna

The objects and installations by Stano Masár reflect the reality formed by a different set of rules. They present also an element of making something non-functional or of a deliberate expression of new functionality and thus overturn the viewer's experience of daily reality. He creates these situations through an idiosyncratic system of the so-called “correctional” interventions that often seem like an inversion of a seemingly inalterable logic. At the same time, this system serves the author as a tool of processing and reflecting the visual art itself, its history or the relevant institutional frameworks. The assertion of the correctional system doesn't present just the world of visual art and its mechanisms and history in a form of a system that could operate as if tilted off its axis and with a different set of rules. The author also challenges the viewers to take part in a sophisticated game that counts on the viewer's cursory knowledge of the art world while at the same time, in the case of his or her gap in that matter, he pushes him or her subversively towards it.

We can find a cogent example in the series of famous artworks turned by the author into pictograms or forms presented at the current exhibition: interpretations of important artworks of famous artists where there is a new, or even paradoxical purpose of the art being created, meaning a category related to artist's work and the art world itself that is definitely worthy of reflection. Deploying playful rather than ironic corrections of artworks in the process of manipulation and thus relativizing their meaning, the author puts forth the fact that looking for a boundary between art and non-art is utopian, and that it is more important to reflect upon their relationship and their parallel practice that can be beneficial for both sides. (M.S.P.)

Stano Masár (*1971) graduated from the Faculty of Education of the Comenius University in Bratislava, with PhD. Studies at Academy of Fine Arts and Design in Bratislava. Took part in study exchange at Thames Valley University in London and was selected for the finale of prizes for young artists (Essl Award, Oskár Čepan Award). His works were part of local and international exhibitions and contemporary art fairs. His works are represented in the Slovak collections: SNG Bratislava, PGU Žilina, Bratislava City Gallery, The Nitra Gallery and others, abroad and in private collections. He lives and works in Bratislava.

(translated by Pavol Fabuš)