After couple of re-schedules due to the Covid-19 my solo exhibition "Visions from subconscious" finally started. Below I place the script of my artist talk where I describe my way to create.

 

"VISIONS FROM SUBCONSCIOUS"

Michael Wright Art Gallery, Port Coquitlam, BC, Canada

Dates: January 21st - April 26th, 2021

Artist’s talk. January 21st, 4:00 pm.

Hello everyone. I am Vladimir Kolosov, artist. First, I would like to express my deep gratitude to everyone at Leigh Square Community Art Village for the opportunity to exhibit at Michael Wright Art Gallery. I would like to say few words about my way to create, to acquaint you with philosophy of my art and give a brief journey behind the scenes of an artwork creation.

1)    Philosophy

The world of nature we live in, the world that fills our conscious and subconscious minds, is a complex self-organizing evolutionary system. This system is characterized by extreme complexity; it is crucial to understand this to provide an adequate description of it. We should be aware of our existence in this system as just an element, which, in turn, is a certain living model, a kind of microcosm. We live in a sequence of multi-layer and multi-dimensional spaces spreading from closed borders to infinity. In the artistic vision, the canvas is a “window” into this world. This is a “window” into the space populated by living and lifeless elements along with their interactions, feelings, emotions, consciousness and unconsciousness, connections to other layers. All of them are directly connected with our subconscious.

2)    My way

Each of my artworks is a dialogue with my subconscious. It is always a set of emotional statements about observations and conclusions I have made. It is always a kind of re-living of a part of someone’s life, or acquaintance with a new sensation that has not been yet experienced.

Every piece at this exhibition reflects something taken from … or connected to the reality that surround us, whether it is tangible objects or intangible thoughts, or dreams. And this is not just a direct reflection. Artworks emphasize the gist of what I observed and understood.

In my opinion, true artist can see the unseen along with the complex tangible and intangible relationships. It is like seeing a big picture, not just a small piece.

During creating process (painting or drawing) I look at objects, whatever they are, from different points of view. I try to determine and highlight the relationships and interactions between these objects and trace their development in space and time.

To me the creation of an artwork is a process of learning something new, it is a sort of research of the inner and outer worlds. Sometimes I deliberately place the objects in certain situations and observe how they might behave. For example: “Cats and a fox”. This piece is about cats which one day met a fox. What are they thinking about? What will they do? Both cats on the back are surprised with such an encounter. Cat in front is trying to communicate…

Now I would like to point out especially important thought that is in every of my works: the art of any kind implies the presence of harmony. I think that the existence itself, whatever we consider, is impossible without harmony. The world is changing from one state to another in space and time. During this changing it is getting one form or another with essential rules and interactions. These forms consist of elements along with their "behavior" and their specific way of development.

Look at “In Search of a Self – identity”. This triptych can be considered as a self-portrait. The whole piece is my research and try to answer question: who am I? I have (I think that majority has) dual origins which co-existed in harmony. These origins are in a permanent motion, they can be balanced, or under certain circumstances one dominates another and vice versa. Everything is changing and circumstances are not staying still. So, this piece reflects the search of identity on different layers: mental, physical, and it goes far beyond. It is not so easy to answer question which looks so simply: “who am I?”.  This painting shows a certain world, a certain space, which in the best way, from my point of view as an artist, corresponds to the results of research and analysis of what I observed while answering question “who am I?”

You can see objects and substances of various nature which populate this space and interact with each other, and with space, over time. These interactions give impulses that can stimulate the viewer's imagination.

Example: “Two hearts in love”. This piece reflects mutual attraction of two objects. They are strongly connected. And this connection goes through metamorphoses: sometimes straight like line, sometimes turbulent like an evolutionary spiral. And both hearts live in the space of the feelings and emotions.

So, I try to encourage the viewer to think, to analyze the observation, or in other words, try to encourage meaningful perception of the artwork. In this case, the artwork remains in the memory of the viewer.

The space of an artwork has a certain specificity, or, using the language of music, certain tonality, which unites all the elements of the picture. The color palette serves not only as a background, but it also determines the interaction of objects and substances. Colors can form a kind of “alliance”. They also can "fight" each other. The result of such "fighting" is an appearance of a new quality of the depicted objects. This is synergy that determines the dynamics and energy of an artwork. The painting becomes polyphonic, with clearly outlined interactions. Making parallels with music, I can say that such a synergy is in consonance, for example, with musical compositions of Alfred Schnitke, John Cage, or Frank Zappa, ...

The creation of an artwork requires great emotional and physical effort to me. When something goes wrong, it can lead to a nervous breakdown, with rethinking of the entire work. Work is always a search for harmony, and it is not always an easy way. Everything is involved in the search of a harmony - line, colour, composition, thought, evolution of images, relationships, perceptions, feelings, and much more. The work must live - it is like a child to whom an artist gives birth and prepares for adulthood. At the beginning it looks like first uncertain steps, then achieving equilibrium in the further transitional motion. This balance or the universal harmony is the moment when an artwork begins its own life, a life of being a subject of attraction and source of knowledge for people.