Artist Name: Alina Grabovsky
Residency Dates: May – July 2024
Born: 1987
Hometown: Kiev, Ukraine
Lives & Works: Vienna, Austria
URL: https://www.alinagrabovsky.com/ | Instagram: @alinagrabovsky
Education:
2016 | Master student at Prof. Marcel van Eeden, State Academy Of Fine Arts Karlsruhe
2015 | Studies in painting at Prof. Erwin Gross, Prof. Matthias Bitzer, Prof. Marcel van Eeden, State Academy of Fine Arts Karlsruhe
2013 | Studies in painting at Prof. Hans Ashley Scheirl, Academy of Fine Arts Vienna
Bio/Statement:
The oil paintings of Alina Grabovsky include abstract and figurative elements. Complete or undamaged objects are rarely found in them. In many cases, there are only parts of a human body, indeterminable poses, or absurd dramatic scenes. Some of them refer to everyday life, leisure time or erotic moments, but the figures and objects are never fully revealed. In terms of technique, she proceeds like a sculptor, starting from an abstract color surface and working out concrete elements. The undeveloped parts are intended to protect the integrity of the subjects. This vagueness serves as some kind of protection and it preserves the characters from identification and (over)determination. At the same time, it offers the possibilities of personal experience and self-perception. Thus identity becomes the subject of constant progression and interaction with the (social) environment. Through the encounter with the “Other“ (otherness), strategies of integration have to be developed.
The ambiguity inherent in Alina Grabovsky’s figurative depiction is accompanied by complex spatial concepts. Free from concrete historical experience and logic structure, rooms open upwards, impossible perspectives appear, and stage-like scenes and sceneries emerge. The variety of spaces refer to migration and alienation.
Alina Grabovsky has won numerous awards and has had several solo and group exhibitions in Europe. In 2023, she was nominated for the STRABAG Artaward and was featured in group exhibitions at the Belvedere 21 Museum for Contemporary Art and the PARALLEL Art Fair for Contemporary Art in Vienna. Her upcoming group exhibitions include: A Suitcase, which will open at Picture Theory Gallery in May 2024 and The Silence of the Sirens, which will open at Back To Athens in Athens, Greece in June 2024.
Support: Alina Grabovsky’s residency is made possible by the support of the Federal Ministry Republic of Austria and the Austrian Cultural Forum NYC.
