Rythmes des calanques (source: Courtesy of Danubiana)
DANUBIANA, the private exhibition space located on an artificial peninsula in the Danube River near Čunovo, features regular shows by representatives of contemporary art. From March 23 until June 17, it offers the collected life’s work of recently deceased Austrian visual artist Markus Prachensky.
“He is one of the most outstanding personalities of the Austrian artistic scene of the second half of the 20th century. The exhibition, called Hommage a Markus Prachensky, marks the occasion of the 80th birthday, which he did not live long enough to celebrate,” Danubiana's head Vincent Polakovič told the TASR newswire. Prachensky died on June 15, 2011.
Exhibition curator Eva Trojanová said that the artist perceived painting as an active process and an open, formal system. He had developed his expressive artistic language with an internal integrity since 1956. The colours of his life became red on a black, white or grey base. His artistic style was also inspired by eastern calligraphy, creating a seemingly organised system of vertical and horizontal lines. He drew inspiration mainly from architectural forms and from places that he came to know during his numerous travels, like Italy, Egypt, California, Mexico and Bali.
“However, his works were not just a visual memory, but a mental connection of the painting and the place. His work has become a part of the international artistic language Art Informel and Tachisme,” Trojanová noted.
Prachensky co-initiated the avant-garde movement associated with the famous Galerie St Stephan founded in 1954, the text accompanying the exhibition states. In 1959, for example, he drew much attention when he poured hundreds of litres of red paint directly onto the wall of a theatre.
Part of the exhibition, which is supported by the Austrian Embassy and co-organised by the Galerie Ulysses in Vienna, consists of artworks by several renowned Slovak artists, including Peter Pollág, Ján Kelemen, Viktor Frešo, Marek Ormandík and Vladimír Popovič.
“They created their works as a tribute to him,” Polakovič explained, as quoted by TASR.
