SOME ARE BORN TO SWEET DELIGHT, SOME ARE BORN TO ENDLESS NIGHT

12 June - 12 July 2020

SOME ARE BORN TO SWEET DELIGHT, SOME ARE BORN TO ENDLESS NIGHT
Ilona Szalay
EXHIBITON OF WORK ON ALUMINIUM, GLASS AND PAPER BY ILONA SZALAY

12 June - 12 July 2020
- Ilona Szalay
  Some are Born to Sweet Delight, 2019
  Oil on aluminium
  200 x 150 cm
- Ilona Szalay
  As Above So Below, 2020
  Oil on aluminium
  200 x 150 cm
In attempting to write something about the work produced for this show I have floundered and struggled. The famous suffragette quote ‘Deeds not words’ came into my mind as I scrambled around searching for the right words. To speak of injustice and inequity at the moment is akin to stating that the world is round or the sky blue, by which I mean that the truth of inequality of all kinds has rarely been so self evident, at least in my lifetime. Be it race, gender or economic these inequalities and fundamental injustices have always surrounded us but recently (and presently) it is as if a beam of searing light has illuminated them in all their brutal depth and breadth.
SO, HOW DOES THIS CLARION CALL TO ADDRESS INJUSTICE CONNECT WITH THE WORK IN THIS EXHIBITION? I RETURN TO THE BLAKE QUOTATION WHICH COMES FROM A POEM ENTITLED ‘TO SEE A WORLD...’ ITSELF PART OF THE AUGURIES OF INNOCENCE. THE POEM BEAUTIFULLY AND INGENIOUSLY POSITS THE NOTION THAT IN OUR UNIVERSE THE MICRO AND THE MACRO ARE INEXTRICABLY LINKED. THAT, TO QUOTE AGAIN THIS TIME FROM WOLFGANG TILLMANS, ‘IF ONE THING MATTERS, EVERYTHING MATTERS’. IT IS AN ANTI- NIHILISM WORLD VIEW WHERE THE SEEMINGLY INSIGNIFICANT IS AS IMPORTANT AS THE MOMENTOUS:
A Robin Redbreast in a cage

Puts all Heaven in a Rage
Now to speak of the images in this context. In the paintings we see statues petrified and bound on their pedestals. Disembodied arms which encircle with dependance and dominance. An acid accusatory - or beseeching? - gaze. Broken mythological figures seemingly stunned by their own constraint and ineptitude. The inevitable passage of time pulsing relentlessly. Explosions which are simultaneously exquisite and deadly. Gloriously ambivalent gods and goddesses remain cooly indifferent to what seethes below. And of course 'the cage' - the Blakian cage for the robin - the frame itself that holds the image, frozen in postures of pleasure, sensuality, pain, confusion, titilation and torture. Particular and peculiar human rituals and urges which play out across the images, and we can see our collective hunger for both pleasure and pain. One of endless binaries with which we quantify and shape experience. And we swoop down into the specific - the micro - the minutiae, the banal, the autobiographical, the journal, the diary. The means through which we lay bare those calamitous, ordinary experiences which serve as the balast of all our lives.
- Ilona Szalay
  Captive, 2020
  Oil on aluminium
  100 x 75 cm
- Ilona Szalay
  Winged Sphinx, 2020
  Oil on aluminium
  75 x 100 cm
Monochrome Series
- Ilona Szalay
  Monochrome Series 17, 2019
  Oil on paper
  42 x 30 cm
  (unframed)
Born in Beirut in 1975, Ilona Szalay completed an English Literature degree at the University of Oxford in 1997, before undertaking further studies at Central St Martins (Byam Shaw School of Art) from which she graduated in 2002 with an MFA. She's the recipient of the ORA Contemporary Art Prize (Italy), a finalist for the prestigious Threadneedle Prize (UK), and with an exhibition history that includes the Royal Academy, the British Painter’s Association and the Barbican; her work has been extensively exhibited in cities including Milan, Rome, Zurich, Toronto and New York.
THROUGH A RANGE OF MEDIA FROM CANVAS TO TRACING PAPER, LED LIGHT TO GLASS, SZALAY ENGAGES THE MULTITUDINOUS DICHOTOMIES THAT MAKE UP BOTH COLLECTIVE AND INDIVIDUAL SUBJECTIVE EXPERIENCE IN RESTRAINED, POETIC VISUAL LANGUAGE. IT IS IN LIMINAL SPACE – THAT BETWEEN SITES OF DOMINANCE AND SUBMISSION, OR POWER AND VULNERABILITY – THAT THE FIGURES IN HER WORK ENCOUNTER ONE ANOTHER.

THE CONTRAST BETWEEN THE SUBJECT SHE PAINTS AND HOW IT IS PAINTED IS NEVER SHARP OR DEMANDING; THE HEAVY, LOOPING STROKES AND SOFT LINES MADE BY HER BRUSH POINT TOWARDS SOMETHING MUCH MORE INGENIOUS AND INTUITIVE. THESE ARE CONTRASTS THAT ARE GESTURED AT, NEVER INSISTED UPON, AND ALLOW FOR A KIND OF DIALECTIC WITH THE VIEWER: A SET OF TECHNIQUES MORE NATIVE TO THE LITERARY ARTS THAN TO THE VISUAL MEDIUM IN WHICH SHE WORKS.
Works on glass
- Ilona Szalay
  Delirium, 2019
  Oil on glass
  170 x 120 cm
- Ilona Szalay
  A Melancholy Eyelid Winked, 2019
  Oil on glass
  170 x 120 cm
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