Warsaw Gallery Weekend 2021
30.09 - 03.10.2021
Al. Jerozolimskie 51/ 2, Warsaw

Common Ground
Keke Vilabelda  |  Max Radawski

The exhibition Common Ground is a meeting of two artists: Keke Vilabelda and Max Radawski, who have an interesting manner of granting material form to concepts imagined in relation to specific or remembered places.

The point of departure consists in paintings by Keke Vilabelda (Spain, 1986), in which the artist explores feelings of remoteness and familiarity with the landscape. Vilabelda juxtaposes two places: Spain and Australia, mutually connected by the existence of pink lakes − peculiarities that can be encountered in both hemispheres. The artist's works are created by mimicking natural processes, such as sedimentation and evaporation. Individual layers of lacquer, drying at time intervals, can crack or dissolve the pigments on the canvas. An important role is also played by gravity, navigating water streams flowing on the surface of the paintings. What − at first glance − seems to be an abstract image, can become a bird's-eye view onto a mysterious landscape.

Works by the young artist from Poznań, Max Radawski (1992), also take us to remote places, evoking the echoes of Oriental culture and philosophy. In his practice, Radawski refers to the Japanese art of stone appreciation (Suiseki) that consists in linking stones to larger senses and forms, like resembling a mighty mountain. His works remind us that relations between humans, objects and nature are woven from moments of common perception and appreciation of time and space. This immersion goes together with sensory explorations, with roaming around far corners of memory, with discovering the palimpsest layer by layer.

Common Ground is a holistic experience allowing us to take a breath, which we need so much nowadays. The search for the common ground indicated in the title can soothe us, can provoke a moment of contemplation, but most of all, provide sensual pleasure.

Julia Stachura