PhotoYung Sung
TextLi-Hao,Chang
There are several dozen works, selected from different stages of creations to the launch of the latest work, for this solo exhibition of Alëna Olasyuk - ''Chiseling the light with ink''.
This solo show attempts not just to classify the history of Olasyuk's creative experience since she has resided in Beijing for many years, but to specifically embody the achievements of life aesthetics that she has kept in mind of ''art is the other words of spiritual cultivation'' as time passes.
Moreover, at a time when contemporary art proclaims the development of globalization, how people viewing Olasyuk, an outsider filling the gaps and vacancies left by the historical factors in China and working for the development of abstract art, it's the issue that this solo exhibition wants to penetrate and talk over.



Pattern 3 (Close Up)
Chinese ink, Nib pen, Paper
29x29 cm
2020
Actually, her creative works are closely related to the spirit of Zen Buddhism on ''No Reliance on the Written Language & Directly Pointing to One's Mind'', and to the theories of the ancient records, such as the Book of Changes describing the process of changes through a system of semiotics.
It might seem like her works are composed of simple images, but every single line is used as the warp and woof to build her works, definitely displaying her consciousness, rationality, and the unique, intangible aesthetics woven from the long-term repetition. Along with people walking forward and the changed angles of vision, these geometric lines that are woven in the triangle, square, or round shapes seem to give life to Olasyuk's creative works.
Through those artistic creations, people can admire the image that the waves kiss the shoreline and look up at the image that the stars in the night sky circle the celestial pole and leave the star trails shown from time to time.

Pattern 6
Chinese ink, Nib pen, Paper
29x29 cm
2020

Duality 1
Chinese ink, Nib pen, Paper
76x56 cm
2016

No name 3
Chinese ink, Nib pen, Paper
76x56 cm
2016
If the creative work connects with a natural phenomenon, there is a certain degree of fitting the thinking of philosophy that explores all living creatures having their origins.
Apart from using the combination of black and white lines, Olasyuk sometimes adds the grey tone to create the grain and texture of works. Her creations quietly create the dialogue with the images and digital network. Just like Hiroshi Sugimoto, a Japanese photographer, keeps considering how to get out from the objects that are ready to photograph or from the symbol form, and then to unearth another level of artistic thinking, or even dig deeper the perspectives of literature, history, and philosophy that have been ignored from the established understanding of human.

Grey 1
中國墨 鋼筆 美術紙
Chinese ink, Nib pen, Paper
75x105 cm
2017

Abstraction 2
中國墨 鋼筆 美術紙
Chinese ink, Nib pen, Paper
74x105 cm
2017
For example, the series of ''Fear'' is just the artistic expression that Olasyuk wants to reverse the established connection between the color of black and the unknown fear, to further highlight the beauty of black shade, and to bring people a calm and stable feeling after adding the balanced geometric style.

Fear 1
中國墨 鋼筆 美術紙
Chinese ink, Nib pen, Paper
76x56 cm
2016
Regarding the debut of the series ''Truth'', the black and white lines have diverse, continuous changes in between the geometric graphics, plus including the thin and straight shapes of red, yellow, blue, and green colors. These extra colors illustrated the unique effect of visual tempo on the images can also be considered as a difficult comparison between the truth and falsity in the age of the information explosion.

Truth 7
中國墨 鋼筆 美術紙
Chinese ink, Nib pen, Paper
35x35 cm
2020

Truth 11
中國墨 鋼筆 美術紙
Chinese ink, Nib pen, Paper
35x35 cm
2020
In this way, it has broken the syntactic structure and meaning of the brush and ink medium.
Through her artwork, the dualism, such as the East and West, concrete and abstract, or even the modern and contemporary ages, is obviously no longer a question that needs to pick up one of two. On the contrary, the most important is to make the visitors fully enjoy the sudden enlightenment that quietly appears from the tiny gap between lines, like wandering at the edge of poetic ambiance. With the dim light, all of us can fix our eyes on the candle flame in the darkroom and up to the distant forest or ocean, and then we will realize that the various forms and attitudes of the time.
Though human beings simultaneously live in the past, present, and future times, we are just the tiny screws, a part of the machine named boundless universe. Fortunately, there must have something left in the end, even if all forms of life are fated to die one by one.
Through transforming the paper as a wall-sized canvas and chiseling the light with ink, what Alëna Olasyuk pursues includes her own inner narrative and the philosophy to life, extends to everything on earth, and even involves the orbit, evolution, and alternation of the macrocosm. The world is currently in a tumult of confusion than before so Olasyuk's artistic pieces of work are not simply a way of consolation for our minds, but also reflecting a brilliant vision full of hope.
|Information|
「Chiseling the Light with Ink — A Solo Exhibition by Alëna Olasyuk」
Location:Venue
Dates:2021.1.5 (Thu.)~30 (Sat.) 11:00~21:00
Opening:2021.1.9 (Sat)14:00 T-PARK ,Wetland Venue 2nd Floor
Organizer:Yii Cultural Enterprise