𝘌𝘓𝘚𝘌𝘞𝘏𝘌𝘙𝘌
Artists: 𝘑𝘰𝘩𝘯 𝘋𝘪𝘤𝘬𝘪𝘯𝘴𝘰𝘯, 𝘔𝘢𝘳𝘪𝘯𝘢 𝘒𝘢𝘴𝘴𝘪𝘢𝘯𝘪𝘥𝘰𝘶, 𝘈𝘪𝘵𝘰𝘳 𝘓𝘢𝘫𝘢𝘳𝘪𝘯-𝘌𝘯𝘤𝘪𝘯𝘢, 𝘔𝘢𝘳𝘪𝘶𝘴 𝘓𝘦𝘩𝘦𝘯𝘦, 𝘚𝘢𝘳𝘢𝘩 𝘔𝘤𝘒𝘦𝘯𝘻𝘪𝘦

Opening: 25.07, 18:00
𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘦𝘹𝘩𝘪𝘣𝘪𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯 𝘤𝘢𝘯 𝘣𝘦 𝘷𝘪𝘴𝘪𝘵𝘦𝘥 𝘣𝘺 𝘢𝘱𝘱𝘰𝘪𝘯𝘵𝘮𝘦𝘯𝘵 𝘧𝘳𝘰𝘮 𝘑𝘶𝘭𝘺 26 𝘵𝘰 𝘈𝘶𝘨𝘶𝘴𝘵 22, 2025.
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Bringing together works by John Dickinson, Marina Kassianidou, Aitor Lajarin-Encina, Marius Lehene, and Sarah McKenzie, this exhibition is an extension of the „Locals Elsewhere” show simultaneously open at Etaj Gallery. Both shows have common denominators in ideas of distance and dislocation as they apply to both meaning and locality. Or at least we can talk about them in such terms; what the actual mutations individual works perform is an open question to be pursued in the situatedness of each. These mutations are an elsewhere, or an otherwise, the works open up  an elsewhere to take refuge in from the tender indifference, or sheer brutality, of our world.
John Dickinson’s recent works invoke negation’s connection to signification, how image and object relate. The legibility of intention and the influence of received forms – say, the frame, are other concerns also looming in the background. Dickinson refers to these as „red herrings, competing orders of information, and contrived incidents” and they converge in the work, impeding and simultaneously establishing potential meaning.
Surfaces of mass-produced materials are, here, the focus of Marina Kassianidou’s interest. Her works establish a tension between these materials as physical supports for marks and them as integral drivers of the work whose „intentions” the artist is, in a sense, following. What results is partially discernible marks that recede into and thus activate semantically the mechanical, accidental, and „natural” marks apart from the artist-made ones.
Familiar but enigmatic scenes unfold in Aitor Lajarin-Encina’s diagrammatic paintings. Symbolically and metaphorically, they refer to existential concerns the main theme of which is, possibly, the question of „where are we, humans, now?”. Unfolding like fables with varying degrees of encryption, his works reflect and ruminate on issues regarding the relationships between humans, between them and the human-made habitat and the „natural world”.
Built in transferred layers of paint woven together in fragments, Marius Lehene’s works open interferences between parallel visual worlds. Cracked, chipped, peeling, and tired, these images and surfaces seem unable to offer immunity to whatever system they locally and temporarily describe. Pondering simultaneous locations, his paintings multiply the point of view, the implicit “I”, and highlight the precariousness of the figure-ground segregation.
Sarah McKenzie documents the built environment through carefully crafted paintings, using architectural changes as evidence of societal, economic, and cultural shifts. She focuses on institutional spaces, particularly American museums and prisons, where cultural transgression is celebrated and criminal transgression is punished. These spaces, distinct from all others, maintain their relationship with the entirety of our built environment, serving as both a critique and a symptom of it.

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