Limited Space of Paper
2019 – 2020drawings – charcoal, pencil, liners, ink on paper
various sizes,
sound
https://soundcloud.com/olga-antonova-art/limited-space-of-paper
charcoal, pencil, liners, ink on paper
50 x 70 cm
50 x 70 cm
I start to work on paper. First, on small paper, making lot of sketches. I don’t focus on composition or form that much. I just make gestures with my hand and explore black and grey, forms and lines, and space of small and limited piece of paper. When I feel that I need to go “deeper” and focus more on the details, I take a bigger format of paper.
I start with very light charcoal form and some lines, then I add black forms. At this point I have composition of an object or form, that holds together. And I start to add elements, lines and flat surfaces, usually I just follow the line and see where it takes me. At that moment I like to be really close to my drawing and all small details of it. At some point my object starts to fall apart. Then I go further and see it from far away to decide how “balanced” it is. Though I don’t use balance or composition, those two words, to make a “perfect” or really stable composition on paper. Usually the objects are seem to be hanging uncomfortably from one side of the paper. So they are not just laying flat on paper, but rather trying to get out of paper. Or they just came into the paper from some other place, they are visiting this limited space of paper and in few minutes they will be gone.
My graphics are like this closed bubble, or maybe system or a small world, where those forms live. I try to put ephemeral into some form.
This world may be similar to ours, or has some connections with our world, but I want it to be different. I want to invite people in it. I want them to be immersed in the life of lines, in different shades of black color, in movement of forms on paper, and in creation of objects, in the life of these objects.
Do they call or provoke any emotions in you? Some may irritate you or on contrary calm you down. Some lines are too persistent, sometimes they go out of paper unexpectedly. And then they are coming back, so why can't they just stay with us and comfort our eyes?
We follow another line with our eyes and it faces an obstacle, a big black surface and dissolves in it, it doesn’t want to go further. When you turn your head and look in the window, do you see the continuation of this line in the tree or in the building? Do you see a continuation of yourself there? How do we know where one form ends and other begins? How do we know where our body ends and nature begins? If you touch paper with pencil, can you transform it? Can this line transform the black surface, is it strong enough? And why do we need this transformation to happen?
charcoal, pencil, liners, ink on paper
50 x 70 cm
50 x 70 cm
charcoal, pencil, liners, ink on paper
50 x 70 cm
Shcherbenko Art Centre, Kyiv, Ukraine
2021
charcoal, pencil, liners, ink on paper
50 x 70 cm
2021
charcoal, pencil, liners, ink on paper
50 x 70 cm
charcoal, pencil, liners, ink on paper
130 x 170 cm
Go Green gallery,
Erlenbach/Zurich, Switzerland
2021
charcoal, pencil, liners, ink on paper50 x 70 cm
130 x 170 cm
Erlenbach/Zurich, Switzerland
2021
charcoal, pencil, liners, ink on paper50 x 70 cm
130 x 170 cm