extensive research

Vered Gersztenkorn

Her work exists carved out of imaginary space; of distance, observation and depth of experience layered upon the “what it is” of simply being, like a tattoo upon the skin of the soul drummed into being and can’t be drowned out.

“I consider ART as my home land or nationality, as well as my ‘religion’ “
There is a canvas crowded with comical creatures full of humor and lust, of vacant eyed-stares seeing outside and through the cloth; the paint covering the holes and gaps not covered by philosophy or art-world practice; a Boschian prelude to judgement and moral speculation as ambiguous and frustrating in its ruinous innocence that threatens to betray by simply being other than what it appears to be (how can judgement be innocent and who can say that that is what is being judged at all ?) as it is final: the paint, the gesture, the hand is permanent and the canvas is forever stained. A presumption about the value and accuracy of looking, of seeing but not perceiving, is central to the aesthetic of Gersztenkorn; it is part of her fun and dilemma, I think. Her canvas is full of the drama of dreams and is equally inconclusive in its non-linear depiction of mock horror, sly winks, slippery shadowy segues and transitions of half-drawn creatures full of secrets weighed equally across the board, the length of the canvas, the length of an interrupted dream that defies interpretation. She lets you in and leaves you flat; her work is an extension of self in a way that expresses a fullness of being sometimes awful and surprising to that very self; is beyond her control or direction and she neither wishes to direct or control it. There is not a meanness of spirit to her process; she is as surprised or stranded in this landscape as any viewer or fellow traveler, which may be the point. Phenomenology informs her work as does chance and a sort of unconscious bringing to the surface of dream imagery (perhaps) in luscious blinding colors or muted hushed tones ; her “abstract work” is deceptively simple both in tone and harmony of the shapes as well as the mutuality of the color: earth tones grounded in loose grids; seemingly haphazardly attached canvas-to-canvas fragments in the midst of language shards full of disjointed sentiment and off-putting grinning demons or farm animals drawn child-like yet ominous; standing just out of reach of reason and accountability. The non-figurative abstractions expand upon the emotional field and feeling of her figurative work, flattening, then condensing into a concentrate a germ of experience either joyous or understated. What resides in memory remains there permanently, covered, concealed and self-contained. That which is recalled at will is full of fault; memory is furtive forever and champions imperfection as its core, hiding more perfectly when it is purposely sought and reveals itself in dreams and a sort of trance-forgetting in a process indifferent to our perceived needs to corral and define experience. Vered leaves all factoring to chance.

Ana Lopes

esad ma. year 01

Tag Archives: extensive research

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