artists

ANTON STOIANOV

1 September – 20 October 2007

opening reception at NICE & FIT: September 1, from 7pm
opening reception at the NICE & FIT SHOWROOM: September 29, from 7pm

Nice & Fit will present two distinct bodies of work by Bulgarian born artist Anton Stoianov. His solo exhibition of panel paintings will open on the 1st of September in the main gallery while a series of ink jet prints and drawings will be shown from September 29th in the Nice & Fit Showroom.

Directly referencing Byzantine icons by employing traditional materials (wood from his native Sofia, gold) he also insists on stylistic similarities such as flat silhouettes against golden backgrounds, unbroken contours that enclose the shapes and scenarios that at first glance seem to be drawn from well-known examples of Byzantine painting.

The “Pantocrator” though is less the judge of the world, or a formal manifestation of heavenly power: in Stoianov’s universe this stern figure becomes a symbol of earthly delights, with a body adorned with elegant, all-over tattoos and a sizeable joint in hand. Elsewhere, amongst an assembly of saints in multi colored robes and bright halos, there emerge large glasses of mouthwatering beer.

The use of this outmoded style apart from a sincere, albeit humorous retake also reveals an interest in sub-cultures: religious, and sexual, or more broadly, an interest in rituals, dress codes and signs that delineate practices, obsessions and attachments to objects. This aspect of his work is also evident in the ink jet prints and drawings that complement and clarify his artistic motivations.

Both the icons and the works on paper emphasize the devotional, fetishist quality he is interested in by means of their presence as “objects”. The thick, vibrant wood of the paintings, and then the various ways of displaying the works on paper. The ink jets, based on photographs mostly of events such as the Folsom Street Festival in San Francisco, depict a vast humanscape animated by a theatrical disposition and delectation for ornament. To make this doubly visible, Stoianov adds rivets, over paints, sandwiches the prints between clear rubber, or attaches them on blackened frames.

The totality of the work comes off as a circuit of visual memories and cultural awareness from the aesthetics of orthodoxy in an ex-communist country to the collective experiences of Panoramabar in Berlin.

Anton Stoianov was born in Sofia, Bulgaria in 1978. He studied in the Universität für Angewandte Kunst, Vienna and is a recent graduate of the Universität der Künste, Berlin. He lives and works in Berlin.
Please contact the gallery for additional information and images.