From Stella Rosa McDonald…
Led by the rolling movement of paint on the surface of plywood Ildiko Kovacs paints intuitive, fluid representations of landscape. Vibrant arcs of colour allude to the phases of the Australian bush and—as in nature—life, death and renewal play out in seemingly endless cycles. Avian, mammalian and human paths appear to overlap and feedback onto themselves and, via the strength and subtlety of the artist’s line, organic forms appear and disappear seasonally.
180x180cm Oil On Plywood
Kovacs, the recent winner of Australia’s richest art prize the Bulgari Art Award, is a skilled mark-maker whose work expertly courts accident and design. In its curvilinear lines and ecstatic use of colour In flight (2015) recalls Brett Whitley’s The Balcony 2 (1975) if the trail of a Sydney ferry from Lavender Bay were replaced with that of a Gouldian Finch across the Great Sandy Desert. And, as Whitely used Deep Ultramarine blue in his distinct evocation of Sydney harbour, Kovacs has claimed her own shade-an ultraviolet amber-in her singular rendition of the land. In thrall of colour, Current is evocative and at the same time wholly strange and captures a landscape that would seem fictional if we didn’t know it to be true.
Until July 19
Martin Browne Contemporary, Paddington
Pic: Ildiko Kovacs, Over The Gap, 2015, oil on plywood, 180×180 cm. Courtesy the artist and Martin Browne Contemporary, Sydney.
