VIKENTI KOMITSKI! selected works.

VIKENTI KOMITSKI! selected works www.sariev-gallery.com

was born in 1983 in Sofia. He lives and works in Berlin. He graduated in Sculpture at the National Academy of Art in Sofia. He works mainly with with objects and installations. Some of his solo shows are BASIC AND THE BEAST in SARIEV Contemporary, Plovdiv (2017); Update in Krinzinger gallery, Vienna (2015), Commodities Unplugged in Sariev Project Space, Plovdiv (2014) New Poor, ICA, Sofia (2013); Subjective Geography, Sariev Contemporary, Plovdiv (2011); 1:200, 0gms gallery, Sofia (2010); No Image Available, The Fridge, Sofia (2010), #1, Vaska Emanuilova Gallery, Sofia (2009). Among the group shows he took part in are World at a Crossroads, National gallery of Iceland (2016), Contemporary Icons; the art of spectacle, 3 rd Danube Biennial, Meulensteen Art Museum, Bratislava (2015), Places of Transition, Freiraum, Museumsquartier Vienna (2014), Balkon Zum Balkan, organized by kunsthalle Baden Baden, (2014 ), Go West! Muzeon Art Park, Moscow, special project for Moscow Young Art Biennial (2012); Is It Free?, NutureArt Gallery, New York (2012);Together Again, Radiator Gallery, New York (2012)East Of Best, Roodkapje, Rotterdam (2011); An Exclusive Object of Art, Dana Charkasi Gallery, Vienna (2011); Entrepot, Krinzinger Gallery, Vienna(2011); Beyond Credit, Antrepo 5,Istanbul (2010); FQ Test, GMG Gallery, Moscow (2010); Photo I Photo You, Calvert 22, London (2010); Breaking Walls Building Networks, Macedonian Museum of Contemporary Art, Tesaloniki (2010); From Ideology to Economy, Contemporary Bulgarian Art 20 Years Later, The State Central Museum of Contemporary History of Russia, Moscow (2009). He was a resident artist at Quartier 21, Museums Quartier and in Krinzinger Projekte in 2014, Vienna, ISCP, New York in 2012, Futura, Prague in 2011 and SIM in Reykiavik in 2009. Komitski is the 2011 Baza award winner. Sariev Contemporary represents Komitski since 2011 and has presented his work at ViennaFair,Focus: Bulgaria at viennacontemporary, Istanbul Contemporary, ArtBrussels and ArtRotterdam 2016 with solo booth. The artistic work of Vikenti Komitski revolves around everyday objects whose context and meaning are analyzed, scrutinized and transferred into a different reality. Komitski changes the nature of objets trouvés as well as of specifically chosen commodity goods that refer to the reality from which they were taken and in which they were originally used. However, Komitski's use of ready-made principles is not only applied to objects but also to ideas. Walter Seidl! Employing the logic of ready-made objectivity and minimum artistic intervention, Vikenti Komitski s works transform everyday-life objects and practices, seeking an instant artistic communication with the viewer. It is as if they are guided by the sudden idea, the momentary switch-over and change of situation, which leads to a different viewpoint.! Vladiya Mihaylova www.sariev-gallery.com/artists/vikenti_komitski/

BLOOOM, 2017 collage 27 х 22.5 cm

BLOOOM, 2017 collage 28 х 23.5 cm

Untitled, 2017 collage 92 x 148 cm

The Habit, 2017 metal chains 13 meters (aprx ) Edition 3 + 1 AP

A message develops through the change of perspective: Always Here Never There. A poetic statement drawn from psychology as a mechanism for self-assertion based on absence. Absence is the engine regardless of whether it is a natural human tendency to follow impulses beyond reality or a historical construct of the contemporary organisation of labour promising contentment somewhere beyond the cycle of catching up with the clock and material needs. Vera Mlechevska Vikenti Komitski Always Here, Never There, 2016 lenticular print 40 x 30 cm Edition 3+2 AP

My Face, 2016 drawing 23.6 x 21 cm

I Swear I m Having Fun, 2016 drawing 23.9 x 18 cm

Don t Leave Your Luggage Unattended, 2016 drawing 21 х 14 cm

Lucky Fetish, 2016 found objects 18 x 18 x 18 cm (aprx.) Edition 3+2 AP

Make Believe, 2015 hot glue on paper 30 x 28.5 cm

! Just Have To, 2016! wood, bronze, metal! 80 x 25 cm! edition 1 of 3+1 AP!

! Untitled, 2016 35mm to digital print! 100 х 70 сm, framed! edition 7 + 2 AP!

Me Myself & I is an installation consisting of 3 selfie sticks arranged in a triangle. The work refers to the notion of the 'Self' in psychoanalytical terms, as a construct of It, Ego and Superego. The self portrait was a genre in the arts for centuries, however reaching recently the status of a common praxis that everyone is engaged with on daily bases. The installation therefore is an comment on the device used to help producing the contemporary self. Vikenti Komitski Vikenti Komitski! Me Myself & I, 2015 selfie sticks 105 x 105 x 105 cm

! No Fun, 2015! hot glue on paper! 29,5 x 26,5 cm

! Untitled, 2015! collage! found images, paper 27 x 20 cm

! Untitled, 2015! collage! found images, paper 28 x 22 cm

The photography shows a domestic plant that I have spraypainted in camouflage patterns and installed in my yard, so that it mixes with the 'wild plants' growing there. The plant is of the type Monstera, sold in Ikea for 9.99 Euro. It is a cultivated plant species, commonly grown for interior decoration and as such rather a product of civilization than of nature. To hide its domestic origin and fit within the otherwise wild plants, the Monstera had to be disguised. The camouflage pattern I chose to do so, most famously refers to the design of military uniforms, themselves imitating the mimetic capacities of certain natural organisms.while the plant stands for an element of natural origin that became an interior item, the soldiers camouflage stands for an element of cultural techniques that allow to remain unnoticed within the wilderness. The action aims at cutting the distance between the natural and the cultural, addressing an ideal point zero, at which the clear distinction between them is blurred. Vikenti Komitski Vikenti Komitski Mimicry (Wild Call), 2015! colour digital photography! 70 x50 cm Edition 5+2 AP

StillWalking is an installation made of multiple plastic figures reminiscent to a series of sculptures by Alberto Giacometti. While the figures in appearance still resemble hiswalking Man, they differ completely in their own 'history', in the process of production they went through. Giacometti's work has thus been transposed from the realm of the artist as creator with his powerful formgiving craftsmanship to the most advanced, fully technological and automatic mode of production; from the individual to the faceless multiplicity; and finally from oldeurope to one of the new centers of the world, China.What returns in this new context of massproduction are z o m b i e s, s t i l l w a l k i n g, b u t a s deindividualized, automatized shadows of a nonfinite past haunting the present. The sculpture here is transformed into an ambiguous sign, hieroglyphic symbol or Emoji.! text (detail) by Vikenti Komitski and Angelika Seppi Vikenti Komitski Still Walking, 2014! PVC plastic figures! dimensions variable! Exhibition view: Update (2015), curated by Manfred Wiplinger, Krinzinger Gallery, Vienna!

Still Walking, 2014! PVC plastic figures! dimenssions variable! (details)

Untitled, 2014 colour digital photography! 100 x 70 cm Edition 5+2 AP

[The Necessery Precondition] is a water-pumping device, which reverses the logic of the objects in use. A generator pumps water through a hose into a rubber boot hanging from the ceiling. The boot operates as a showerhead letting the water sprinkle through its soles. Hence, the artist reverses the logic of the rubber boot to protect feet from water and instead turns it into a permeable device that questions the traditional use of objects.!! Walter Seidl! Vikenti Komitski The Necessary Precondition, 2014! installation! plastic, metal, water, electricity! dimension variable! 3+2 AP Exhibition view: Commodities Unplugged (2014), curated by Walter Seidl, Sariev Project Space, 2014

video documentation! http://youtu.be/wo8fqwcwgpu

Alle Katzen sind Kühe in der Nacht (All Cats are Cows at Night), 2014! collage on plastic sheets! two pieces 100 x 50 cm

Filter Mask, 2014! installation, textile, plastic! variable size

Collage (1), 2014! from the series Vacuum,! collage! 42x60 cm

Collage (2), 2014 from the series Vacuum, collage 42x60 cm

Collage (5), 2014 from the series Vacuum collage 42x60 cm

The work was provoked by the decision of the Bulgarian government in 2013 to erect a 300 km fence wall on state's border with Turkey in order to 'control the influx of refugees into the country'. Paradoxically, quarter a century earlier the same border were preventing people from leaving the country. The installation is set on wheels, and the viewer is able to move it through the space, evoking the impression of new territorial devisions appearing around the globe.!! Vikenti Komitski! In Komitski s installation Pop-Up Wall, which he developed during his residency at the MQ, the artist addresses how borders are still drawn up to protect Fortress Europe. [ ] By putting it on wheels, he demonstrates how walls fluctuate, constantly being put up and taken down.!! Walter Seidl! Vikenti Komitski Pop Up Wall, 2014! installation! steel, metal wire! 300 x 200 x 90 cm! unique work Installation view: Places of Transition (2014), curated by Walter Seidl, MuseumsQuartier, Vienna

Found images from Dairy farmer protests from all around the world were projected over milk spilled on the flour of a gallery.! Vikenti Komitski White Noise, 2014! performance for 5 liters of milk and found images (in collaboration with Angelika Seppi)

Beauty Is Not About The Way Things Look, 2014! LED lights, dimensions variable! edition of 3+2 АР

Cory Catfish are a breed of fish kept for cleaning the glass and water in the aquarium, they thus provide a kind of service to other fish and the aquatic milieu as such. The live Catfish in the aquarium is a full time worker.while referring to Damien Hirst's "The impossibility of Death in the mind of someone Living", the work sets a counterpoint to the metaphorical shark in formaldehyde and replaces the impossible double bind of "Death" and Living" with "Unemployment" and "Working". Death and Unemployment, Living andworking thus become the two basic mutually exclusive couples, denoting the definition and value of the existence of working men in a capitalist society.! Vikenti Komitski Vikenti Komitski The Impossibility Of Unemployment In The Mind Of Someone Working, 2013! fish*, water, aquarium, water heater, pump

The Way I Remember That Building, 2013! color prints, 40x 60 cm,! edition 5+2 АР

I Am Too Sad To Text You, 2013! colour print, 50 x 70 cm,! edition of 5+2 AP

Why In Love...? was commissioned by NutureArt gallery, Brooklyn, New York for the exhibition Is It Free. 300 Hundred Tshirts were produced and given away for free to the audience of the show. The print on the Tshirts is a redesign of the famous I Love New York logo made by Milton Glaser. The symbols of the logo are rearranged in order to read (in a 'SMS fashion')! Why In Love?! Vikenti Komitski Vikenti Komitski Why In Love?, 2012! silkscreen printed Tshirts unlimited edition

Why In Love?, 2012! silkscreen printed Tshirts unlimited edition

Clash, 2011! sound, 6.02 min! edition of 5+2 AP! Watch video:! http://vikenti-komitski.com/works/clash/

Alter ego, 2011! plant, glass, earth, plastic pot! dimensions variable! edition of 3

[ ] instead of assigning the four cardinal directions, the artist replaces them with the readable W E S T. By overturning the psysical order of the world, he ironically alludes to the superpower of the Western countries that constitute the most important historical, cultural and political reference in the discourse on Bulgarian identity.!! Viktoria Draganova! Vikenti Komitski WEST, 2011! Site specific installation! various sizes! edition of 3+1 AP Installation view: Subjective Geography (2011), Sariev Gallery, Plovdiv, Bulgaria

Stairway To Heaven, 2011! modified piano (so one can play on it with feet

And what about Permanent (2011), a video on how the artist tattoos an arraw on his finger? The artwork refers to a citation of Marcel Duchamp, who talks about the artist not being the hand that creates but as the finger that show. This work is part in the series of references to iconic masterpieces of Western art; however, as the curator Vladiya Mihaylova commented [ ] the works of Vikenti Komitski are more a parody of possible references than another try in conceptualism.!! The present work is an ironical taking on Duchamp s words, at the same time it is a provocation reflecting its meaning. What does the finger point at the West? Or at the post-modern geography of nowhere, where no clear answers exist? What is left over, after cool conceptiualism has been taken literally? Finally, is it a permanent subjection to the legacies of Western art theory, where Duchamp plays a key role, or an aesthetic subversion on those rules?!! Viktoria Draganova! Vikenti Komitski Permanent, 2011! Video documentation of the project 4 20! edition: 3+2 AP

Permanent, 2011! Video documentation of the project 4 20! edition: 3+2 AP

Switzerland is not boring, 2011! collage! 28 x 7 cm

Another neon piece of art, 2011! neon lamps,! dimensions variable! edition of 3

Another neon piece of art, 2011! neon lamps,! dimensions variable! edition of 3 Installation view: No Image Available (2010), curated by Vladiya Mihaylova, the fridge, Sofia

SuperUntitled, 2011! Office Chair,Rotating Engine,! dimensions variable! edition 3+2 Ap

Generator, 2011! computer, clam! dimensions variable! edition of 3 + 2 / AP

Textsculpture, 2011! poster / sticker! edition 3+2 AP

Pyraminds are dwellings for eternal residence and tents for transitory. We use tents to go and live outside our usual environment (camping, refugee camps). The tent could be seen as a symbol of life, assuming that life, in a more general sense, is a transitory experience. Who wants to live forever is a temporary pyramid made of tents. Vikenti Komitski Vikenti Komitski Who wants to live forever, 2010! polyester tents,! dimensions variable! edition of 3+2AP Installation view:, BAZA Award Nominees 2011, Sofia City Gallery

Who wants to live forever, 2010! polyester tents,! dimensions variable! edition of 3+2AP Installation view: in front of the National Palace of Culture in Sofia, in the framework of Sofia Contemporary 2012, curated by Iara Boubnova

Tom & Jerry live, 2010! Video, 3,42! edition of 10! Watch video:! http://vikenti-komitski.com/works/tom-jerry-live/

I wish I was that cool, 2010! digital print,! dimensions variable! edition of 5+2 AP

! R U Ready, 2010! video documentation of a project (40 min),! disco ball situated in a school room during a geography class! edition of 3+2 AP

Peaks of oil, 2010! 6 channel video installation,! (scenes with exploding gas stations from Hollywood movies)! 30 sec! edition of 3

Together Again is a work that coincides with the line of the present. Its author, Vikenti Komitski, collages the political geography of the world into an almost unified continent. Pangaea seems to represent a lost unity of the worlds that has been restored in the form of a colourful geopolitical patchwork. The optimism emanating from the title Together Again puts an end, an end to geographic, political, economic and cultural division. The world looks compiled as in a children s game, profaned in a way. As Giorgio Agamben writes, To profane means to open the possibility of a special form of negligence, which ignores separation or, rather, puts it to a particular use. Vikenti Komitski also profanes the very process of creation, deliberately abandoning everything he learned from his education. Regrouped by the artist, the continents are a parody of the ongoing processes of uniformity which penetrate into all spheres of human relations and where everything functions in a state of separation from itself, solely by its exchangeable economic value. Ultimately, what the new state of global peace created by Vikenti Komitski tells us is that the earth is flat.! Vera Mlechevska Vikenti Komitski Together again, 2009! world map, paper! edition of 3+2 AP

Titled, 2009! LED board, text! edition of 3+2 AP

Monument to missed opportunities, 2009! found object and rotating mechanism,! edition of 3

The work is an intervention on an edition of 'Short Political Dictionary published by Partizdat Sofia in the 1970s. After the 1989 changes in the country, the language and discourse of the dictionary were left completely outdated.! Vikenti Komitski Vikenti Komitski Broken book, 2009! Book, short political dictionary,! dimensions variable,! edition of 3 + 2 AP

Untitled (scissors), 2009! scissors,architecture,! dimenssions variable! edition of 3 Installation view: Entrepot, curated by Rene Block, Krinzinger gallery, Wien

My Budget For This Exhibition was made out of the exact sum of money, provided by the organisers of an exibition for production of a piece. The money were changed into coins and exibited in a vitrine.! Vikenti Komitski Vikenti Komitski My budget for this exhibition, 2009! coins-exact sum of money for project execution Installation view: Temptation Chalga (2009), curated by Svetlana Kuyumdzhieva and Vessela Nozharova, Sofia City Gallery

Being clever doesn t help, 2008! 100 x 20 x 70 cm,! wood, cardboard,! edition of 3! one produced

Sometimes from a different angle things look quite the same, 2008! site specific video installation

! Biography! Education 2002-2006 National Academy of Art, Sofia, Sculpture department 2000 Exchange with Bath College of Arts, UK! 1999-2002 The Fine Art School, Sofia Solo exhibitions 2017 BASIC AND THE BEAST, curated by Vera Mlechevska, SARIEV Contemporary, Plovdiv 2015 Update, curated by Manfred Wiplinger, Krinzinger Gallery, Vienna 2014 Commodities Unplugged, curated by Walter Seidl, SARIEV Project Space, Plovdiv 2013 I Am You Are Me, curated by Margarita Kudrina, Bulart Gallery, Varna New Poor, ICA, Sofia 2011 Subjective Geography, Sariev Gallery, Plovdiv, Bulgaria 2010 1:200, curated by Vladiya Mihailova, 0gms, Sofia No Image Available, curated by Vladiya Mihailova, The Fridge, Sofia! 2009 #1, curated by Vladiya Mihailova, Vaska Emanuilova Gallery Selected Group exhibitions 2016! Art Metamedia 10.0, curated by Martina Mezak, Kreuzberg Pavilion, Berlin! Variofocus: ARTISTS Bulgaria, curated by Iara Boubnova and Vessela Nozharova, Focus Bulgaria at Viennacontemporary 2015 Curated by Vienna, Verkauf in Nebenräumen, curated by Harald Falckenberg, Krinzinger Projecte, Vienna Contemporary Icons; the art of spectacle, 3rd Danube Biennale, curated by Kristina Jarosova, Meulensteen Art Museum, Bratislava Tuesday Night, Baba Vasa Celar, Shabla Krinzinger gallery residency exibition 2014 Bulgarian-Romanian Union - A Retrospective, curated by Vlad Nanca, Salonul De Proiecte, Bucharest Last Splash, curated by Leda Ekimova, Pistolet gallery, Sofia Balkon zum Balkan, curated by Ksenija Cocova, Kunsthalle Baden Baden Българска работа Bulgarische Arbeit, geh8 Kunstraum & Ateliers e.v., Dresden, Germany Content of Form, In der Kubatur des Kabinetts, Fluc, Vienna More Space For Art, Numerous billboards in Sofia Places of Transition, Freiraum, Museumsquartier, Vienna 2013 All I Can Do is Art, curated by Vera Mlechevska, Czech Center, Prague 2012 Overlapping Biennial-Biennial of Young Artists, curated by Maria Vassileva, Bucharest / virtual Sofia Contemporary festival, curated by Iara Boubnova Go West! Muzeon Art Park, Moscow, special project for Moscow Young Art Biennail, curated by Andrey Parshikov Is It Free?, curated by Marco Antonini, NutureArt gallery, New York Isolation, curated by Meetropa, Senatsreservenspeicher, Berlin Toether Again, curated by Daniela Kostova, Radiator gallery, New York Group Show, curated by Vladiya Mihailova and Ivan Moudov, 0GMS gallery, Sofia 2011 East Of Best, curated by KOLEKTIFF, Roodkapje, Rotterdam! Why Duchamp?, curated by Maria Vasileva, SAMCA, Sofia 4+4 Days in Motion festival, Prague, project curated by Marketa Stara The End And Beyond, Week of Contemporary Art, curated by Vera Mlechevska, Bania Starinna center for contemporary arts, Plovdiv Poor But Sexy, Sariev Gallery, Plovdiv Transgressions, curated by Vera Mlechevska, Credo Bonum gallery, Sofia Entrepot, curated by Rene Block, Krinzinger gallery, Wien An Exclusive Object of Art, curated by Iara Boubnova, Dana Charkasi gallery, Wien 2010 Handle with Care, curated by Vyara Mlechevska, Unicredit Studio, Milano August in Art Biennale, Varna, curated by Maria Vassileva Beyond Credit, curated by Maria Vassileva, Iara Boubnova, Luchezar Boyadjiev, Antrepo 5, Istanbul FQ Test, curated by Andrey Parshikov, GMG Gallery, Moscow Border Situations-Drawing in contemporary art, curated by Yovo Panchev, Industrialna 11 Gallery, Sofia Photo I Photo you, curated by Iara Boubnova, Calvert 22, London Breaking Walls, Building Networks, curated by Iara Boubnova, Lydia Chatziiakovou, Christos Savvidis, Thalea Stefanidou, Macedonian museum of contemporary art, Thessaloniki

2009 From Ideology to Economy. Contemporary Bulgarian Art 20 years later, curated by Iara Boubnova and Maria Vassileva, The State Central Museum of Contemporary History of Russia, Moscow Gaudenz B. Ruf Award Shortlist, 2009, R.Aleksiev Gallery, Sofia, Nominees of BAZA Award, Sofia City Art Gallery The Temptation of Chalga, curated by Vessela Nozharova and Svetlana Kuyumdzhieva, Sofia City Art Gallery 2008 Democracy Talks - Konsthall C in Sofia, curated by Vladiya Mihailova, a project of Per Haselberg, Vaska Emanuilova Gallery, Sofia Reality Blurs, curated by Vladiya Mihailova, Vaska Emanuilova Gallery, Sofia Bulgaria-actual scene, Ludwig Museum, Koblenz, Germany Biennale for Young Artists from Europe and the Mediterranean, Bari, Italy Nominees of BAZA Award, Sofia City Art Gallery No Place Like Home/No Home Like Place, curated by Yovo Panchev, Red House, Sofia 2007 Remember Sofia Underground, Shipka, Sofia, curated by Yovo Panchev And Ruen Ruenov Other Awards! 2011! Baza Award Winner!! 2009/2011! Ruf Award Nominee!! Residency!!!!!!!!!!! 2014!!!!!!!!!!!! Krinzinger gallery residency, Petömihalyfa! Krinzinger Projekte, Vienna!!!!!!!! Quartier 21, Museumsquartier, Vienna!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 2012 ISCP, New York 2011 Futura, Prague 2009 SIM, Reykjavik!! 2014 Road Movies, curator, video art show in traveling buses White Noise, performance in collaboration with Angelika Seppi, Sofia Underground Festival Siesta, lecture performance in collaboration with Angelika Seppi, GT22, Maribor 2011 Lecture and workshop on self made tools and music instruments in Karlin Studios, Prague.! Selected books and catalogs Places of Transition, Gülsen Bal and Walter Seidl, Vienna, 2014. Changing Perceptions, curated by Kathrin Singer, texts by Josephine Breese and Henry Little, London, 2012. East of Best, Roodkapje Rotterdam, 2012. Aktuelle Szene Bulgarien. Works of the Ludwig Collection of the Eighties and new developments of art in Bulgaria. Ludwig Museum, 2008!

www.sariev-gallery.com Facebook Instagram Twitter - SARIEV Contemporary 40, Otets Paisiy str. Bulgaria, Plovdiv 4000 +359 888520375 office@sariev-gallery.com