Seven-song of Death - Strabag Art-Lounge, Vienna by Liza Libenko 22.3.2024 - 19.4.2024

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Isn't the range of what we know too great to be able to interpret particular image in the only possible way? It is only a consequence of the author's interpretation of something much more important: off-screen narratives and the need for a certain revolt at the expense of generally established expectations.

But there is a certain type of thinking and „its“ image, which takes the form of an delirium-interpretation. We suspect that behind the image space there is a story that cannot be contained by any form of speech, and that the image – that thus acquires a specific form of representation – opens in front of us the painful territories of what attracts us, but what we do not want to think about. It's only here that the image fulfills its primary scenario: not to calm, disturb, or literally make the lethargy of ordinary thinking uncomfortable.

Behind the form of an easily interpretable reality evoked by the aesthetics of Libenko's paintings, there are references to a concrete reality: the subjects of these paintings are generally associated with Ukrainian events, also due to the painter's origin. But let's not associate her paintings simply with the horrors of war: this interpretation is a trap. Let's free ourselves from the primary reference to Ukrainian events aestheticized by the medium of painting. The narrative of these paintings goes far on. Is it possible to detect a kind of visionary here? The narration and formalism of her paintings are close to symbolism, expressionism, or the arte-povera movement, we find here the non-subjectivity of tachism or references to the war graphics of the German New Objectivity, as well as the visuality of Anselm Kiefer or Baudelaire's poetry. The fact is that Libenko developed this speech through systematic work, and that her every previous move was directed towards this form of statement.

– Martin Gerboc