MARIE VAŘEKOVÁ

Weary Shout

Painting Studio 3

As part of your graduate work, you present images and objects that thematically address today’s information and sensory overload, which we traditionally associate mainly with the digital sphere. What advantages do traditional media provide?
I do not think the two are mutually exclusive. You cannot escape the experience of a highly algorithmicized society, even when working with so-called “traditional” media. The paintings to a certain extent mimic the degradation of visual information, as we know it from the online environment – like blurring, compression, or the image’s gradual disintegration or even complete breakdown. They reflect the influence of algorithmic flows and generative codes, the experience of our extensive online existence, and their impact on emotions. Painting as a medium has a long historical context, one which has been significantly impacted by the technological revolution of Web 2.0. I therefore believe that painting does not stand apart from the digital world, but arises within conditions in which the internet and algorithms have become the infrastructure of everyday life and have had a fundamental social impact.

But you also work with puppet-like objects. How did you come to work with them?
Although I avoided puppets while studying my BA degree in puppetry, I have come full circle and returned to them in my latest work. I draw on my experience with the puppetry craft and its tradition. The displayed puppet is highly stylized and has an expressive face. It is not any specific personification, but it does reflect my interest in various mythological creatures (although it is not based on any specific religious system). It rather bears traces of my own imagination.

Is intuition important to your work? Do you work deliberately, or do you let the process itself guide you?
Intuition and chance play a major role in my work. I don’t construct narratives; I am not interested in storytelling, but I prioritize the moment over any premeditated structure. Instead of building a narrative, I prefer immediate, perhaps even raw, expressive forms that arise from impulse rather than deliberation – though this doesn’t preclude structure, meticulousness, and precision. I have long been fascinated by the question of how to communicate to the viewer a process that, in my view, carries elements of the sacred and the mystical. Although it may sound somewhat melodramatic, spirituality and mystery are deeply present in my work. However, I realize that this is a realm that is, at its core, very fragile and difficult to convey, and this compels me to seek ways to talk about it. Sometimes to the point of being unbearable.

photo: Polina Davydenko