The folds, the form, the fecundity.
They are all the same. The same two pieces conjoined. Again and again, the same flat surfaces turned and pinned and sewn into this one form. Duplicated. This is repeated portraiture, but quite unlike a room full of Jawlensky’s, which are seeking a mystical understanding of self and the other. This is not Warhol, where each copy becomes a weaker impression (though the whole is doubtless impressive). This is self portrait after self portrait, discovered by the guilt of the voyeur.
Allison Malinsky’s “Proper Part of the Whole” is an exhibition of new sculptural paintings exhibited at Galería Victor Saavedra, Calle Enric Granados, 97, Barcelona (May 5th to June 11th 2016).
Abstract cut outs, painted flat on the canvas. Folded into two unifying forms. But this is not yin and yang. No lingam and yoni. This is the one, becoming its true form from two.The eye is drawn in, but slightly embarrassed, as a lover seeing his conquest for the first time, not knowing quite where to look. The eye flitting nervously. Tentatively, his courage increases and his eye can stay. Taking in. With courage he chooses to touch, with knuckle, with thumb. Nervously he withdraws.
This duality of lust and respect is drawn out in the names of the works. Forces of nature are brought to bear. Physics teaching us that arms are levers and legs are clamps. Equal and opposite. The pull of gravity, the tug on the anchor, holding in place our desires or impulses or irrevocable fervours. Or holding us fast against a fall or a tempest. Or keeping us safe in our lovers’ arms.
But where in this town can you please your lovers? Where has Malinsky been, seeking young love as it plays out its physical form? Peeking over a bush, walking past a knoll, catching a glimpse as she reads “The Teahouse Fire” while sunbathing. The park, the beach, and for a while in the lapping of the waves. On the hilltops, at Tibidabo, as high as the sky, with Jesus looking down, but with no condemnation. Colour, which had more meaning in the plane, is beyond the fleshy tones of nakedness. Half clothed, by sea or sand or verdant leaf. Not the primal fig, but the grass on which, after a picnic, the body is laid.
Unfortunate creases attach uniqueness. But looking is beyond the purely aesthetic. Knowing that this object, this lover’s desire, which when brought to fruition, will be invisible but felt inevitably. Malinsky’s art rolls through the gallery like this wave, the pace changing like lovemaking. Once staccato, then a cadence, then the chorus opens up and the voyeur can sit on Saavedra’s wonderful sofa, lean back and take in the cacophony that leads to an inevitable, barely concealed, public climax.
