Hominid Detachment I/III

Acrylic with powdered iron on canvas, 280cm x 150cm, *2020

i'm really excited about flooding a scene with information, but at the same time not revealing everything right away. This is one of the most complex hand-drawings I have created so far.

Sunday

I started working on this hand drawing in the first week of the lockdown in March. I was aiming for a “digital dystopia” -like topic in order to capture this time of uncertainty and the resulting polarization. Due to the advancing digitization, parts of society seem to get lost more and more in algorithms of confusing information. Especially in a time of lockdown, in which people get their impression of reality almost exclusively through a screen, with content suggested by personalized algorithms, can be very distracting for a society and therefore particularly disadvantageous in times of a pandemic.

Butterfly 2020

Acrylics on canvas, 140cm x 100cm, *2019 

This mixture of screen print and painting is part of a three-part series that also includes “Butterfly” and another large-format painting on canvas called “Sunday”. The drawing and the corresponding prints on canvas were created in 2019. The composition of the figures and colored fields should bring a certain rhythm into the picture and, together with the spatiality of the drawing, create a certain tension with the viewer. As if a bomb were exploding directly behind the viewer, dividing the whole sci-fi-like scenario into bright blue and white areas. Yet the picture is charged with silence. Figures as rigid as plastic soldiers wait for a signal. Directional receivers and war tubes are devices for the acoustic localization of sound sources that were used by several nations in the course of the First World War, before the invention of radar, for the passive detection of enemy aircraft and projectiles. However, for the most part not particularly successful. Undoubtedly history knows parallel and similar situations and the question arises again and again whether and how dark chapters could repeat themselves. This work could, among other things, be understood as an allegory of tension and waiting for the unknown or an invisible danger.

Distanz (Distance) 

Max Brenner and Nick Havelka picked up the theme homelessness. 
They worked because of corona situation separately on sketches for the painting, after some time when the restrictions were not that harsh anymore they chose to start work together and create kind of a whole co world which depict the feeling of homelessness and human misery. During the sketching process they decided to step back with their own style and decided to create for them completely new handwriting. In this 170 × 190 cm big painting one can see the total complexity and rich narrative of the circle of misery that many people end up in. The whole scene is supplemented with kinds creatures that represents the obstacles in the already exhausting fight. This painting was great inspirational experience for both artist. Painting on the same canvas at the same time, trying to feel and understand the possible correspondence between the scenes and their possible complement, figuring out how to convey the whole experience of homelessness. These were the key challenges for both the artists. 

Just flip a coin

It is difficult to make contemporary art in province. 
It is impossible to make contemporary art in Ukrainian province.
Everyone thought that before quarantine.  Than became clear that online communication erased the boundaries between province and big city, but nothing has changed for us, because we always thought otherwise. We live in isolation a-priori because we live in Ukraine firstly and in province secondly. We don’t want to change our place of leaving. Here we have enough time and inspiration to make art. Finally, we have the World and we have each other. 
Some artists are looking for new forms in art because they need to stand out in artistic diversity.  Others are looking for new forms to find their niche in the art market.  We are looking for new forms, because it gives us new opportunities for communication. We are looking for close similarity in way-of-thinking and way-of-filling at first. Therefore, one day photographer and architect on education Max Afanasyev met choreographer and contemporary dancer Julia Artemenko. They both did not want to leave their Ukrainian province, but they both needed to find a way to accept this province with the help of art. It was a long process of correspondence. Finally artists, which were so different before, found common language how to tell about their place of leaving and their fillings – site-specific performances. “Body of works” is our bodies. During performances artists communicate using words or not. The main art product is photos but the process is important no less, because it gives us amazing filling of communication – a very sincere and honest way of communication with the space, time, people, with each other.

https://www.artconnect.com/profile/youlite
https://www.artconnect.com/profile/max-afanasyev


Try to live here

Seeing comes before words.
A great director said to me once, it’s either right or it isn’t.
That I can relate to in terms of what balance is, firstly it’s about intuition then technique to achieve it.

Max is strongly influenced by his work in film and TV, designing a project to help tell the story.
The story is different each time, by using locations,architecture,colour and texture Max helps craft the story, bring it to life.
He knows that more one studies detail the more variation, association and atmosphere one finds.
Max is equally intrigued by the notion of how one might recall, for instance, a TV series.How a seemingly linear set of images and events form into a cohesive memory.

It’s equally a question as to whether stories are circular or complete and parts come into and out of focus, information becomes close up or recedes in scale and relevance.
The idea of balance comes from how and if all disparate parts hang together and make a whole.
The first question Max always asks of a Drama, or a of its component parts, is ‘what is the tone of it?’
Then it’s a riff on that idea and tone.
The same applies to painting in a more organic manner, the tone needs to be specific and be its own story.
Max draws on much varied visual imagery including the very nature of how we receive, and how much, visual information we sift and take for granted.Within this the act of painting still bears great relevance for Max and distils into a purer timeless form many of those digital, organic and real life influences questioning and upholding the joy of the basics of form and colour.


Born in 1959 Max Gottlieb grew up in North London and attended Hampstead Comprehensive school.
Self taught as a Production Designer and Artist Max starting work in the 90s on music videos then commercials and onto his first  Feature film ‘Shopping’ staring Jude Law and Sadie Frost, Max honed his craft moving between different formats, more recently taking on multi series TV with such series as The Tunnel, Marcella and ITVs ‘Strangers’.



Balance
Distill
Explore


Balance

All photos are taken by me on iPhone in different places around the Globe. All presented artworks are alter-ego to the agressive vibes surrounding us every day, with my art I invite you to re-discover the Nature where we all find our Origins and Roots. On each artwork you will find the drawn elements which recall the important meaning (from my artist’s philosophy):

The Eye as a Protector or a Supervisor, but even the Protector needs to be protected to keep the Earth balance (so why I enclose the Eye between my hands);

The Balloon(s), our thoughts – dreams – fantasies, or you catch them or they fly away… The recall to *carpe diem* or *react right now*.

The Flower(s) as a symbol of the Earth beauty so easy to destroy.

The Monster, in my philosophy it serves to protect and not to destroy, a kind of  Gargoyle.

All together, symbols, try to keep the harmony.


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