Aigana Galilux opens her Lux Ex Machina exhibition in London

2023-04-22 12:16:13

Fluid, bulging, translucent, sharp-edged, rippling, and electric, the Kazakh artist’s latest luminous paintings Gali family they seem at once precise and otherworldly, mystical and technological. Like a distant star or planet, each composition contains and transmits its own captivating and mysterious energy. Lux Ex Machinais Gali’s second solo exhibition at our gallery and the title of this series of paintings, marks an important turning point in her practice and a new artistic freedom.

The things that happen when I tune in to the light; alive to the very specific vibrational tone of that day, what emerges are shapes that express your character.

The title of the exhibition comes from the term theatrical deus ex machina, which was first used in ancient Roman and Greek dramas to indicate the timely appearance of a god who would unravel and resolve the plot. Here, deus (God) becomes lux in reference to the various sources of light that appear in the paintings -luminous orbits, pulsating electric currents, wide yellow beams-, but also to the process of making the work. Gali has painted from a very young age, but while his previous series, such as Steppe o Tengri, reflecting inner states and personal experiences, these last paintings exist outside of the artist: they are the product of light or perhaps of a spiritual realm that is beyond our ordinary perception. Gali sees herself as a conduit guided by a higher force, but entering this state requires physical and mental disciplineas well as a sense of ritual.

I have to get to the studio with empty head and give myself completely to the process so that the work flows through me and evolves on its own terms. It’s almost like doing photography, developing images in a dark room where I can only see one step ahead.

MANAS, 2023. Oil, acrylic on canvas – 130 x 160 cm

Although Gali does not adhere to any specific spiritual belief system, her works bear some resemblance to those of Hilma of Klint o Agnes Peltonwhose paintings similarly balanced the forms biomorphic y geometric and they displayed an inventive use of colour. Like af Klint, Gali believes that these latest works are “like messages for humanity or explanations for certain processes” that she herself is not yet able to fully understand. In them we find organic shapes that evoke soft spaces, similar to wombs, together with structures that look mechanic with metal rods and cables, which seem to conduct light, electricity or even flames. Some of the shapes travel between works, such as the black disc that appears in various paintings, which sometimes looks like the pupil of an eye and other times a portal to or from another world. In other places, a membranous surfaceserves as a cocoon or amniotic sac for nascent forms, while the planetary symbols (moons?) of Khan Tengri and the rigid diagrammatic structures seem to allude to different energy sources and evolution.

ONAI I (YELLOW), 2023. Acrylic, oil on canvas – 80 x 80 cm

For Gali, however, it is not so much about the individual forms as about the complex patterns and often bilateral that arise from their placement on the canvas and what they can indicate: energy channels, mystical formulas the bandages, biological codesplans of new worlds o life forms. Each work bears a Kazakh title as a nod to the artist’s heritage and as a way of distancing the paintings from the everyday language that her mostly European or Anglophone audience uses to classify (and confine) the world around them. Without being able to understand their meaning, the words become another type of visual code, an invitation to leave the familiar and enter the unknown.

KOZA, 2023. Acrylic, oil on canvas – 110 x 82 cm

It’s this feeling of mystery combined with the color intensity and the shape that makes these works so captivating. Although we may not immediately or ever fully understand the messages they convey, we can feel the vital force that radiates from the surface and within it is an expansive sense of possibility and freedom. To even entertain the idea that there is something else out there, beyond our perception, is to broaden the way we think about our bodies, societies, and nature.