Victor Man: With the First Totters
Annet Gelink Gallery proudly presents the second solo exhibition of Romanian artist Victor Man (1974). Since his exhibition in The Bakery in 2005 he has received broad attention from international art critics in art magazines such as ArtReview, Contemporary, ArtForum and FlashArt. His first publication came out recently - issued by Annet Gelink Gallery in cooperation with Timothy Taylor Gallery and Gallery Johnen + Schöttle - which renders a survey of his painting in the past three years (The Place I'm Coming From, ISBN: 0-9548837-6-4, € 26).
The title of the exhibition is a quote from a monologue piece of Samuel Beckett (1906 - 1989) and refers to the feeling of insecurity with which one enters new terrain. In Man's new works this seems to be a terrain of secret sexual practices. The paintings give a glimpse into a world of sexual rituals the instruments and techniques of which are only hinted at: the subjects are singled out from their context. A transvestite dressed in a shiny green latex dress wearing a mask, yet what the action implies in which he seems to be engaged we do not get to see, his kneeing position seems strangely frozen in action (Untitled, 2006).
The latex dress stands in contrast to the organic nature of the fur on which the painting is fixed to the wall. It seems to refer to the fetish character objects can receive. The ambiguity of function is taken up by the wooden construction placed in the central space of the gallery. The cross-position recall the position of the woman's legs in the painting hung in the same room, yet the original function of this found item remains open.
Another group of works seem to recall images from dreams or memories. These are images drawn from the collective memory rather than private experience. There is a television from the 60s; a firework frozen on its screen evokes an old-fashioned idea of entertainment and sensation. A black bird sitting in a lamp, which stirs up awkward memories of wild animals caught in domestic environments.
It is characteristic for Man's paintings that the origin of his imagery is highly ambiguous. Victor Man is inspired by visual material from various sources such as books, magazines, internet or postcards. He strips these images from their original meaning by taking them out of their previous context. Sometimes presenting his pictures in combination with a mural, or by showing them in pairs Man stimulates the associative process.
