Solo exhibition “The Disasters of Nature”
The Department of Prints and Drawings of Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts, Zagreb, Croatia
Gallery of Croatian center in Vienna, Vienna, Austria
“Lifeless landscapes – a graphic simulation of chaos”
Mario Matoković, an artist from Osijek, comes from the assembly of young graphic artists who have presented themselves at the exhibition in the Department of Prints and Drawings of Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts, following the 6th Croatian triennial of graphic art. His works have hitherto, in their thematic weft, carried the message of social criticism and societal problems. His artworks are executed in a modality of symbols and signs, thus this project represents a radical departure and detachment from his previous social engagement within the experiment of integrating traditional graphic art with digital media, installation, and video.
This recent production, realized using the traditional techniques of graphic art, with the complete devotion to the laws of deep print, represents Matoković’s complete return to the vocational sensibility for the classical medium of graphic art. The new graphic cycle was created in the originally nameless domain of the artist’s deep print experiment, in a sphere completely devoid of outside stimuli, on a polygon of strict matrix laws. By escaping into abstract forms, dissolving the physical world, the world of figuration and formative structures, the execution of his basic creative principle involves the graphic manifestation of simulacrum naturae.
As an affected eyewitness of the horrible floods that have hit eastern Slavonija this spring, Matoković finalizes his latest graphic cycle under the implicating title The Disasters of Nature (Strahote prirode), alluding to the title of Goya’s wartime cycle The Disasters of War (Strahote rata, originally Los Desastres de la Guerra) – of frightfully meticulous content and cataclysmic atmosphere. By directly referring to the title of Goya’s work (It will be the same again), in an private ductus code, Matoković interprets the fatalism and the monstrosity of the ultimate “disaster as the ultimate raw event… which leaves the world hanging” (J. Baudillard).
His achromatic cycle represents a graphic simulation of chaos caused by a natural disaster, after which the precisely defined forms of reality lose their clear contours, dissolving into abstract blotches of deadness and nothingness. The laws of the matrix, as well as the deep print sensations of copper etching, aquatint, reservage, open bite etching, drypoint, andwhite aquatint, in their final compositional executions, perfectly simulate the consequences of chaos, the disharmony of the lifeless landscapes (as the author calls them), desolated by the ruinous energy of nature. The associative narratives have been given a footing in the graphic reflections – in the form of enformal aquatint blotches of metamorphosed sludge, whirlpools, reflections of the water surface (Big wave, Blackness), of the line mimesis of the horizon (Life away), or faithfully drawn-out nature (It was alive once). The expressive thick ductus structures represent the perceptive illusions of the rapidly welling volume of water carrying people, animals, and objects (Moment of deafness; Silence), i.e. the graphic artist’s interpretative perspective of the monstrous consequences of the enraged nature.Using black and white contrasts and grey gradations, Matoković emphasizes the dichotomies and the extremities of today – in our seemingly intact world, one cyclone can set into motion destructive calamities which upset the “perfect” order, demonstrating the dark side of reality (We don’t have a home anymore) in a disrupted harmony between man and nature.
curator Ruzica Pepelko, 2014
Samostalna izložba “The Disasters of Nature”
Studio Kabineta grafike Hrvatske akademije znanosti i umjetnosti
Mrtvi pejzaži – grafička simulacija kaosa
U plejadi mladih grafičara koji se nakon 6. hrvatskog trijenala grafike predstavljaju izložbom u Studiju Kabineta grafike i osječki je umjetnik Mario Matoković. Njegovi su radovi dosad u svojoj sižejnoj potki nosili poruke kritičkog osvrta na stanje društva i socijalnu problematiku. Likovna ostvarenja konkretizirana su u modalitetu simbola i znakovlja, stoga je ovaj projekt radikalan zaokret i odmak od njegova dosadašnjeg socijalnog angažmana u eksperimentu integriranja tradicionalne grafike s digitalnim medijem, instalacijama, videom.
Recentna produkcija ostvarena u tradicionalnim grafičkim tehnikama uz potpuno posvećenje zakonitostima dubokog tiska Matokovićev je povratak vokacijskom senzibilitetu za klasični grafički medij. Novi grafički ciklus nastao je u prvotno neimenovanom ozračju umjetnikova dubokotisnog eksperimenta, u sferi potpune izoliranosti od vanjskih podražaja i na poligonu matričnih zakonitosti. Bijegom u apstraktne forme, poništavanjem stvarnog svijeta, svijeta figuracije i oblikovnih struktura, u prosedejnoj završnici involvirao je grafičke manifestacije simulakruma naturae.
Bivajući potresenim svjedokom strašnih poplava koje su proljetos pogodile istočnu Slavoniju, Matoković finalizira recentni grafički ciklus pod znakovitim nazivom The Disasters of Nature (Strahote prirode), aludirajući na naslov Goyina ratnog ciklusa The Disasters of War (Strahote rata; u originalu Los Desastres de la Guerra) – strahotne sadržajne akribije i kataklizmične atmosfere. Izravnom referencom na naslov jednog Goyina rada (It will be the same again), Matoković u osobnom duktusnom kôdu interpretira fatalizam i monstruoznost ultimativne „katastrofe kao maksimalnog sirovog događaja… koji svijet ostavlja u napetosti“ (J. Baudrillard).
Njegov akromatski ciklus grafička je simulacija kaosa uzrokovanog elementarnom nepogodom nakon koje točno definirani vidovi realiteta gube jasne konture rastapajući se u apstraktne mrlje mrtvila i ništavila. Matrične datosti i dubokotisne senzacije bakropisa, akvatinte, rezervaža, otvorenog jetkanja, suhe igle i bijele akvatinte u svojim finalnim kompozicijskim rješenjima savršeno simuliraju posljedice kaosa, disharmoniju mrtvih pejzaža (kako ih autor imenuje) opustošenih razornom energijom nature. Asocijativni su narativi uporište dobili u grafičkim refleksijama – akvatintnim enformalističkim mrljama metaforiziranog mulja, vodenih kovitlaca, odbljesaka vodene površine (Big wave; Blackness), linijskim mimezama horizonta (Life away) ili vjerno iscrtane prirode (It was alive once). Ekspresivne guste duktusne strukture perceptivne su iluzije brzo naviruće vodene mase koja nosi ljude, životinje, stvari (Moment of deafness; Silence), odnosno grafičarevo interpetativno viđenje čudovišnih posljedica pobješnjele prirode.
Crno-bijelim kontrastima i sivim gradacijama Matoković naglašava oprečnosti i ekstremnosti današnjice – u našem prividno intaktnom svijetu jedna ciklona pokrene razorne stihije koje poremete „savršeno“ organiziran red, demonstrirajući nam mračnu stranu realiteta (We don´t have home anymore) u narušenom skladu između ljudi i prirode.
kustosica Ružica Pepelko, 2104.
Mario Matoković 