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A project by Iskra Blagoeva
Confised communication II: postrealism - a solo exhibition by Georgi Iankov
Artist bio
Georgi Iankov was born in Sofia in 1964. In 1990 he graduated from the National Academy of Arts majoring in “Poster” and five years later he is invited as an assistant in the same department. In 2003 he becomes associate professor and since 2010 he is a professor majoring in “Poster” in department “Poser and visual communication.” As of January 2020 he is Rector of the National Academy of Art.
Iankov has worked in advertising for over twenty years and is the author of many publicity campaigns and videos. He also operates in various fields of the visual arts – poster, graphic design, object, installation and more. He is a member of the Graphic Design section of the Union of Bulgarian Artist. Iankov is also co-founder and chairman of New Visual International Group.
Goergi Iankov has participated in numerous forums connected to poster art and design including: The International Triennial of Stage Poster – Sofia, International Biennale of Humor and Satire - Gabrovo; Human Rights Day Exhibition, Palace of Nations - Geneva; Exhibition of the Bulgarian poster – Basel. Together with with Prof. Nikolay Mladenov Yankov participated in the project Poetry on the Wall - Embassy of Austria in Sofia. Other exhibitions include Law and Justice Exhibition - Potsdam, Tunisia, Munich, Dusseldorf, Berlin, 2014, Cultural Institute, London; “I Love This Movie,” Casa Del Cinema - Rome, So Independent - New York. Accompanying program of the 56th Venice Biennale, Imago Mundi: Map of the New Art, Luciano; Benetton Collection, Giorgio Chini Foundation - Venice 2015; Grayscale - Serbia, Contemporary Bulgarian Humorous Poster - Austria.
He has won numerous awards for graphic design and held seven solo exhibitions.
Georgi Iankov is a well known author to the Bulgarian public, who with his appearances in the last decade, invariably radiates in the cultural space various visual and semantic constructions. For this unexpectedness he is venerated. One may start with the fact, that he is a proven master of poster and graphic design. And this fact cannot be but a lasting reflection on everything he creates, including this present exhibition, which consist of paintings in the most classical sense of the term. It is characteristic of Iankov to “cross” techniques and materials and, it is no coincidence, that there was a period in which the imagery of his posters materialized from the photographed objectivity of complex objects and installations constructed by him. Let me remind myself, that a few years ago his past exhibition was connected to emphasizing specific materiality, with light and kinetics transforming the effects of metal, wood, glass and “ready-mades.”
In this current exhibition, Georgi Iankov is set on medium-sized canvases, all equally squared. In them, again, we observe the typical for this artist balance on the fine line between seriousness and humor. A good example in this direction is the
painting “EXIsT”, which, in addition to being minimally composed and with a limited color pattern, is also a play on words. The word “S” has become a horizontally positioned door knob, which if pressed, resolves the question of whether to exist or exit from existence. In the work “The temple” the boat’s nose becomes a dome temple with a cross and fish in the sky, or vice versa. Elsewhere, a deliberate search has been sought for the famous denial of Rene Magritte’s pipe, in “This is a pipe Rene,” as well as in “This is not an accordion.”
Spatial accent in this exhibition are the works painted on bed stands, whose definition is bordering between objects and picturesque surfaces. They posses the dualistic qualities characteristic of the so-called neo-dada movement from the middle of the last century. And, again ingeniously presented for this particular exhibition, are works such as “Batman,” “Black and white TV” and “Escape.” This is an exhibition which holds a wealth of meanings because it is itself a storehouse of messages and a crossroad for possible inventions.
Svilen Stefanov