A Moebius Loop

a-s-t-r-a х SPRING/BREAK Art Show NY20

March 3-9 2020

625 MADISON AVENUE New York

ROOM 1156

a-s-t-r-a is pleased to announce its participation at SPRING/BREAK Art Show in New York on March 3-9, 2020 with a special project.

The project Moebius Loop, curated by Anna Evtiugina and Alina Kryukova, features works by Dima Hunzelweg, Maria Agureeva and Graham Akins.

“There is a God-shaped hole in human consciousness, where the divine had always been but had disappeared, leaving an emptiness behind.”
– Jean-Paul Sartre

“Black holes ain’t as black as they are painted. They are not the eternal prisons they were once thought. Things can get out of a black hole, both to the outside, and possibly to another universe. So if you feel you are in a black hole, don’t give up. There’s a way out.”
– Stephen Hawking

Every human is a microcosm that tries to comprehend and mirror a macrocosm that is the Universe, at the same time rendering an explanation for it in course of an infinite reflection resembling a Moebius loop. It represents a void that invariably requires an ever-busy filling and exploration. This void that we all have to carry inside ourselves is ambivalent. On the one hand, it is a black hole that always requires filling, always craves for more. Sip by sip, it drains our lives, sucking all the energy of creation dry. This process results in invincible entropy, an eternal nothing. On the other hand, it is a bridge connecting a person with the Platonic world of ideas, a world of awareness and understanding that we are more than what we consume, much more than this hole of overconsumption.

Simulacra, illusions disguised as facts of real life, numerous interpretations, Deleuzian copies, and total replication are the toils of the 21st century we got caught ourselves in. Still, the dread before the Universe fills our minds. It can be a reflection of this beautiful gigantism with all its ambitious plans and futuristic dreams. Nevertheless, the attractiveness of the unknown, the urge to interact and the fear of silence, make a quest for self-awareness a new Odyssey, possibly opening up a new reality for new humans. The energy of human life and consciousness is a creative force that fights entropy, chaos, decay and death, this overflowing amount of the dead, which should be put to an end.

Exploring how outer ‘less’ requires inner ‘more’, Dima Hunzelweg’s extremely eye-catching and skin-friendly wall objects are results of an extremely meticulous and time-consuming working process. He expands the boundaries of art and media both literally and metaphorically. In terms of form, his paintings transcend the limits of a flat pictorial image. Through the use of wider stretchers, they morph into wall objects blurring the distinction between painting and sculpture, between 2D and 3D dimensions.

Driven by such questions as how many restrictions can be put on a human body by fashion and entertainment related industries and how natural and artificial can coexist in a framework of a single object, Maria Agureeva creates enigmatic and painfully sensual works of art. She explores the relationships between the human body and nature, between real and fake. Can the surrogate substitute the ‘real’ if we are not able to distinguish between what is real and what is not anymore? The lines are getting blurred, and nothing seems intentionally artiﬁcial and we take it as a norm.

Graham Akins deals with our complicated relationship to reality, simulation, and how technology mediates the depiction of the external world. Using photography, video, 3D modeling and sculpture, the artist creates large multimedia installations. They play with notions of objecthood, the uncanny valley, our understanding of otherness and contemporary methods of image-making. Recent projects include investigations into the aestheticization of trash, experimental wildlife documentaries that explore the quality of our relationships to other minds and found object sculptural video combines that abstract materials into simulated forgeries of themselves.

Working in XR, video and photography Nikita Shokhov focuses on the duality of human nature: body and mind, science and religion, sexuality and politics. In “Scan” project, he goes beyond the boundaries of traditional “direct” photography, but at the same time remains in the field of documentary. The slit scanning technique applied in the presented series of works cracks onto the phenomenon of mass processions and allows the viewer to see the 4th dimension - the dimension of time - that the human eye would not normally see.

Agureeva Maria

Maria Agureeva was born in 1985.

Graduated from Saint Petersburg State University of Technology and Design (faculty of graphic design, 2003-2009), IKA (Institute of Contemporary Art, Moscow) (2014-2015). The artist works with installations, videos, performances, and sculptures. Lives and works in Los Angeles and Moscow.

Maria Agureeva was born in 1985.

AWARDS AND RESIDENCIES

2021 - Residence Via Farini (from December to January), Milan
2019 - Ruinart Art Patronat grant
2018 - 18th Los Angeles street art center (August to September).
2018 - Grant from TRUST FOR MUTUAL UNDERSTANDING.
2018 - the Winner of the special award, Laguna Art Prize.
2017 - Residence Unlimited New York (from February to April).
2013 - nominee of the Kandinsky prize.

PERSONAL EXHIBITION

2019 - Passing, Cosmoscow, patron of Ruinart, Moscow.
2019 - Dust, coaxial art Foundation, Los Angeles.
2018 - It will never be enough, Isabel Lesmeister gallery, Regensburg.
2018 - Pearl Dust will settle on the soft skin covering all the cracks, atrium gallery, 18th Street Arts Center, Los Angeles.
2018 - you can imagine what will remain after, Anna Nova gallery, Saint Petersburg.
2018 - Dust, Elektrozavod gallery, Moscow.
2015 - Binary promises, Parallel program of the 6th Moscow Biennale of contemporary art, Pechersky Gallery, Moscow.
2014 - gardens of compromises, Erarta Museum, Saint Petersburg.
2013-Those women who can destroy the infinite, Parallel program of the 5th Moscow Biennale of contemporary art, Pechersky Gallery, Moscow.
2012 - Citius, altius, fortius! Commodification, the Factory Project together with Gridchinhall, Moscow.
The 2012 Excavations. Ground 0, Gridchinhall, Moscow.
2011 - a series of "Tormozit", gridchinhall, Moscow.
2011 - a series of "Tormozit", Gallery Kadieff, Helsinki.
2009 - series "Tormozit", AL Gallery, Saint Petersburg.

SELECTED GROUP EXHIBITIONS

2022 - Kammerflimmern. Outdoor screening organized by ArtSect NFT Gallery х Digi-gxl. Nuremberg, Germany
2021 - Cosmoscow art fair, a-s-t-r-a gallery, Moscow
2021 - Women Artists. One and The Other, Gilyarovsky center (ArtsWanted), Moscow
2020 - No matter. What?, Leer-Emptyblank, Vienna
2020 - Personal contacts, Durden and Ray, Los Angeles
2020 - Where's the Remote?, SIT STILL PROJECTS, Connecticut
2020 - Mobius Loop, A-S-T-R-A gallery, Spring break art show NY, New York
2020 - Cosmoscow Art Fair, Moscow, Russia
2020 - ENTER Art Fair, Copenhagen, Denmark
2020-Technosphere, Supercollider Gallery x Femmebit, La spring art show, Los Angeles.
2019 - MMOMA 99/19, 20th anniversary exhibition, MMOMA, Moscow.
2019 - Recycle or die, Gum Red line, Moscow.
2019 - The Regenerates, Nook Gallery, Los Angeles.
2017 - Just cause, Black Ball Projects, new York.
2016 - Unofficial language, VINZAVOD center for contemporary art, Parallel program of the V Moscow international Biennale of young art, Moscow.
2016 - All eyes on me, VINZAVOD center for contemporary art, Moscow.
2016 - Nominibus Trivialibus, Sinonimis Selectis, MSU Botanical garden (Aptekarsky sad), Parallel program of the V Moscow international Biennale of young art, Moscow.
2015 - Mirrors, MMOMA, Moscow.
2015 - One in another. Art of new and old media in the era of high-speed Internet, MMOMA, Moscow.
2015 - Development of freedom, Factory Project, Moscow.
2013 - I wouldn't draw now, Parallel program of the 5th Moscow Biennale of contemporary art, Agency Art.Ru, Moscow.
2013 - state Order, VINZAVOD center for contemporary art, Moscow.
2012 - Project Cena (Price), Parallel program of the III Moscow international Biennale of young art, Agency Art.Ru, Moscow.
2011 - Art in Mind, Brick lane Gallery, London.
2010 - festival of contemporary art Psychonautics, Saint Petersburg.
2010 - Summary, All Gallery, Saint Petersburg.

"My main task as an artist is to show how the body becomes a hybrid space in which the materiality of human flesh is linked to individual consciousness and identity. This is caused by a General desire to change yourself to avoid social pressure, as well as an even greater desire to discover your true form and inner authenticity.

In my work, I focus on the contradiction between what is considered real and what is subjective about the human body. I explore the social norms of stamped attractiveness that push us to Polish our own image, as people Polish billions of images on the Internet. There is an internal conflict between the natural features of our appearance imposed by artificial standards and our willingness to oppose them with absolute truth. This dynamic pushes me to explore the boundaries beyond which the body becomes as much an object as any other.

I often work with synthetic materials because they refer to my themes of physicality, moving from authenticity to art. My work emphasizes that body transformation is referential, archetypal, and tribal, and is now becoming a form of modern secular religion. This forces me to explore the boundaries beyond which the body eventually becomes the same object as any other.

I am currently studying the interaction of the human body and the environment, which I deeply feel is inextricably linked as one ecology, one synergistic Union. Humanity, and especially artists, can no longer turn a blind eye to this problem because of how acutely we have all begun to feel the impact of changes in Nature on all of us."
Maria Agureeva

SELECTED PUBLICATIONS: