Martin Lukáč : I'd rather be with you Martin Lukáč

The exhibited paintings of Martin Lukáč (1989) represent two styles of his work in two large series. In the first, he develops his serial painting technique based around the variation of shape and color of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Comics heroes, well known among the cultural milieu of Lukáč’s generation which grew up during the complex years of Slovakia’s post-socialist transformation. Where the first part, consisting of the anthropomorphic turtles, works through pop-cultural painting, and systematically reacts to the production of mass media, the second part of the exhibited paintings consists of works which rather find inspiration in the avant-garde and elite painting culture represented by a formal language which draws on the hundred-year history of abstract painting. Where the first part, consisting of the anthropomorphic turtles, works through pop-cultural painting, and systematically reacts to the production of mass media, the second part of the exhibited paintings consists of works which rather find inspiration in the avant-garde and elite painting culture represented by a formal language which draws on the hundred-year history of abstract painting. Lukáč balances between form and formlessness, and his canvases toe the threshold between the amorphic and the moment when a form emerges and takes shape. He is interested in manifesting those shapes which culture perceives as artificial, as part of a wide repository of signs and attributes of abstract painting.