TakeOff

18. September 2024. – 27. September
MegnyitóOpening: September 17, 2024, 4:00 pm
MegnyitjaRemarks by: Szabó Ádám

I grew up in Budapest and graduated from the Warsaw Academy of Fine Arts (Akademia Sztuk Pięknych)
sculpture (1973-78), so I can call myself a sculptor by training, even though I don’t make sculptures in the traditional sense.

In 1979 I did my postgraduate studies in ceramics at the College of Fine and Applied Arts in Wroclaw. Since 1980 I have been living in Norway, where, in addition to my work as a sculptor, I work as a teacher at the Bergen School of Architecture, working on subjects related to perception and visual expression. Most of my work is site-specific, mostly based on the relationship between space, light and ‘objects’.

I am interested in how material makes light visible, how it gives it body or even reflects it. How light touches form, evokes it and space, how light lives inseparably with shadow, of course. My installations are mainly based on the conditions of the site. The situation, the visible or hidden value, the energy, the character of the space is crucial in the development and creation of the works.

I choose the material – which can be anything from building materials to textiles, more traditional art or natural materials, found waste, or anything else – depending on the location and the subject matter. Likewise, the light can be natural or artificial, and the actual ‘space’ small or large. I often work with shades of white, but I don’t rule out the use of other colours if the situation calls for otherwise.
My work seeks connection through the senses, not illustration. The narrative, if we can talk about it at all, lies in the visitor. I like it when the visitor is physically active in the space I create. In this sense, we should not talk about exhibitions, but rather about spatial events.

My work TakeOff is a light installation specifically tailored to the Parthenon-Frieze room of the Hungarian University of Fine Arts. The proportions of the windowless, roof-lit room, with a floor area of 10×6 metres and a height of almost 7 metres, are unconventional.

I try to articulate the natural light by shaping the space. You could say that I ‘guide’ the visitor through the space for the sake of the experience of light.

Eva Kun

Translated with DeepL.com (free version)