artists
Katya Emelyanova
Katya Emelyanova (b. 1984) is a multimedia artist, photographer and sculptor. Her practice addresses the phenomenology of the aesthetic effect mediated through art objects. She calls for evoking positive emotions, direct experience and simplicity of access and impression, echoing the practices of fauvism and abstractionism. The vivid colours and shapes appear first as ideas, which traverse through materialisation filters towards finding the appropriate aesthetic form. Despite the immediacy of engagement with the viewer, her works are intricate and often technologically complex, requiring the artist to collaborate with engineers.
The traditions of aniconism, semiotics, totemism and expressionism inform her sculptural works. She masterfully blends clay, glaze, stone and other materials in playful and meticulously orchestrated shapes and colours. The striking textures of her artworks juxtapose to create a unique effect on the viewer, simultaneously mesmerising, confusing and evoking almost primal desire.
Her photographic and mixed media practice delves into existentialism of in-betweenness and transitory stages in the human condition. There is, however, an essential element of femininity, clearly perceivable in thin boundaries between symbols and shapes, suggesting the harmonic and unobstructed flow of transition, freedom to choose the next stage of one’s existence, and overcoming the dictate of normative control.
Walking on the razor-sharp line of separation between genres and mediums is crucial in Emelyanova’s practice. The play between high and low, immediate and profound, and surface and depth are intricate but apparent. In the context of contemporary interdisciplinary blending between various creative fields such as art, design, fashion and commerce, the artist’s practice fittingly claims the place of hybridity, presenting itself ready to challenge the antiquated attitudes to categorisation. This transversality of her attitude demonstrates her skill in shapeshifting, turning classical into modern and traditional into innovative
The traditions of aniconism, semiotics, totemism and expressionism inform her sculptural works. She masterfully blends clay, glaze, stone and other materials in playful and meticulously orchestrated shapes and colours. The striking textures of her artworks juxtapose to create a unique effect on the viewer, simultaneously mesmerising, confusing and evoking almost primal desire.
Her photographic and mixed media practice delves into existentialism of in-betweenness and transitory stages in the human condition. There is, however, an essential element of femininity, clearly perceivable in thin boundaries between symbols and shapes, suggesting the harmonic and unobstructed flow of transition, freedom to choose the next stage of one’s existence, and overcoming the dictate of normative control.
Walking on the razor-sharp line of separation between genres and mediums is crucial in Emelyanova’s practice. The play between high and low, immediate and profound, and surface and depth are intricate but apparent. In the context of contemporary interdisciplinary blending between various creative fields such as art, design, fashion and commerce, the artist’s practice fittingly claims the place of hybridity, presenting itself ready to challenge the antiquated attitudes to categorisation. This transversality of her attitude demonstrates her skill in shapeshifting, turning classical into modern and traditional into innovative
artist's works