Larisa Ackov / The Spirits of the Earth - Музеј примењене уметности БеоградМузеј примењене уметности Београд

The Exhibition is organized within the Salon of Contemporary Applied Art of MAA

The Exhibition will be opened by Ms Biljana Vukotić, Senior Curator of MAA

Larisa Ackov (1971) belongs to the generation of younger Serbian ceramists she excels from by established esthetic values and ease in handling different media on one hand and on the other by skillful mastering the ceramic material which helps her create works with unique visual and structural messages. The solo exhibition “The Spirits of the Earth” of the author rounds off her previous opus begun with the first exhibition Encounter in 2000 and simultaneously introduces her newly articulated visual and artistic explorations. The artist had 12 solo exhibitions held in Belgrade, Toronto and Pančevo since the year 2000. The artist who lives and works in Pančevo is a winner of important awards and recognitions including the Grand Award of the XIII Triennial of Ceramics in 2009.

The exhibition “The Spirits of the Earth” of Larisa Ackov displays floor and wall ceramic installation consisting of a number of segments – larger sculptures and panels which also exist as independent wholes. Their combinations provide unique and unrepeatable installation which forms different visual wholes, symbolic scenes. Central part of each of the segments of the complex, polysemic composition contains imaginary vision of specific microcosm dominated by landscapes with angels and spirits. This model of installation is created as result of interactive relationship with the space it occupies and in the same time it is an artistic performance act. The artist said: “All elements which I often randomly take from various boxes regardless of their number turn from pieces into wholes…” without much hesitation or planning and the result is logical and designed to every detail.

The exhibition curator Biljana Vukotić wrote in the catalogue that the “Advance from the usual practice of Larisa Ackov is result of application of an actual visual sign or structure of signs within the urban and industrial context. Angels concerned about the fate of humans resembling the ones in the movie Sky over Berlin by Vim Wenders hover in these panels above the existing chemical and nuclear facilities which are nowadays polluting the environment. Transformation of usual iconographic model of angels is perceivable in the works of this series since they are now represented as humans with conspicuous gender characteristics”.

In a specific integrated structure of the floor installation The Spirits of the Earth soft porcelain, terracotta and engobe the already formed pieces and figures create complete symbolic wholes Micronaut, Geobiology, Maya, Treeworld which are fused by sand background into distinct wholes in the final stage of creation in the exhibition space of the Museum of Applied Art. Aesthetic forms of explicitly personal accomplishments of Larisa Ackov are imbued by intimist contents. She shapes them by applying the logics of forming a painting rather than traditional sculpture medium.

Geobiology I

2006 soft porcelain and red clay, colored with engobe, with glazed elements and details on sand foundation, 450 x 350 cm, detail

Geobiology I,

2006 soft porcelain and red clay, colored with engobe, with glazed elements and details on sand foundation, 450 x 350 cm, detail

Geobiology II

2006 soft porcelain and red clay, colored with engobe, with glazed elements and details on sand foundation, 500 x 400 cm, detail

Geobiology II

2006 soft porcelain and red clay, colored with engobe, with glazed elements and details on sand foundation, 500 x 400 cm, detail

Маyа

2009 soft porcelain and red clay, colored with engobe, with glazed elements and details on sand foundation, 400 x 400 cm, detail

Micronaut

2010 soft porcelain and red clay, colored with engobe with glazed elements and details on sand foundation, 450 x 450 cm, detai

Micronaut

2010

Micronaut

2010 detail

Regard

2007 porcelain, screen printing, engobe, 18 x 24.5 cm, Property of the Museum of Applied Art, inv. no. 23124

Above the Water Desert

2007 porcelain, screen printing, engobe, 17.5 x 26.5 cm, Property of the Museum of Applied Art, inv. no. 23124

Sights I

2009 porcelain, screen printing, engobe, 37 x 27 cm, Property of the Museum of Applied Art, inv. no. 23706 Grand Prix, 13th Ceramics Triennial, Belgrade - Subotica, 2009

Sights II

2009 porcelain, screen printing, engobe, 37 x 27 cm, Property of the Museum of Applied Art, inv. no. 23706 Grand Prix, 13th Ceramics Triennial, Belgrade - Subotica, 2009

Writing on the Palm

2007 porcelain, screen printing, engobe, 20 x 18 cm, Property of the Museum of Applied Art, inv. no. 23124

In Front of the Factory

2007 porcelain, screen printing, engobe, 18 x 12 cm, Property of the Museum of Applied Art, inv. no. 23124 Conversation, 2007 porcelain, screen printing, engobe, 27 x 20 cm, Property of the Museum of Applied Art, inv. no. 23124 Nuclear Powerplant, 2008 porcelain, screen printing, engobe, 26 x 20 cm From cycle Warning, 2010 combined technique (screen printing, colored ceramics), 18 x 12 cm each From cycle Flights, 2010 combined technique (screen printing, colored ceramics), 18 x 12 cm each