Samurai, kabuki masks, toy figures, and strange creatures inhabit Floating World, Sándor Rácmolnár’s upcoming solo exhibition presenting a new body of work. The artist’s signature use of vintage paper draws inspiration this time from Japan, where he spent several weeks. Old printed documents, notebook pages, and stampes provide the foundation for his meticulously crafted characters. Rácmolnár lift traditional motifs and figures into his visual world. Charts, markings and notes on the papers become integral elements of the compositions, as Rácmolnár connects his own figures to these traces of the past, creating new narratives.
The exhibition title refers to ukiyo-e, “pictures of the floating world.” Originally, the term “floating world” was a Buddhist concept expressing the transience of earthly existence. During the Edo period, it came to describe the vibrant world of urban entertainment districts, kabuki theatres, geisha, and fleeting sensual pleasures, immortalized in ukiyo-e woodblock prints. Rácmolnár in his new body of work incorporates historical figures thus share an imaginative pictorial space with characters inspired by manga, toys, and contemporary Japanese visual culture.
The artist’s experience of Japan appears not as a travelogue, but as the starting point for new stories. Within this detailed and humorous universe, the heroic may become grotesque, the threatening playful, and the familiar strange. Each work in Floating World preserves the traces of an earlier story while inviting viewers to discover a new one.