VOLUME

Project Info

VOLUME is an installation treating the painting as space rather than as part of it. It is a joint creative collaboration of two contemporary female artists Kaliya Kalacheva and Gergana Tabakova. They endeavour to rethink the early 20^th century avant-garde concepts exploring the relationship between architecture and geometric abstraction.

The installation has been created over a period of 11 months, during which the two artists were in constant dialogue but respected each other’s personal preferences towards the use of materials and composition. They explored diverging approaches and bring them to a crossing point while developing their mutual work.

In their own words “In the preparation and process of finding the forms with which to work, we looked at architectural examples, including the town of Shibam in Yemen, the architectural temple complex in Baalbek (Lebanon), the Meenakshi temple in Madurai (India), the Angkor Wat temple complex in Cambodia, temples in Ahmedabad, the ancient city of Persepolis in Iran, as well as modern cities such as Tokyo and Chicago.”

In their search for the common ground between all these spaces, the artists focused on the column, which, in addition to being a fundamental architectural element, is also a symbol deeply inscribed in our collective memory. It is a connection between earth and heaven, it represents a vertical line relating to the organisation and orientation of the world, and it is a symbol of the tree and the power of creation.

In Volume installation, multiple columns build up a rhythmic structure where one can walk around and experience a space that is both integral but made up of discrete internal fragments.

The project is supported by the Ministry of Culture of Republic of Bulgaria.