Mariana Vassileva / works

biography
works
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Project:          treasure is everywhere
Installation:    Fabric, metal, synthetic material, wood, 2 light bulbs
                     200 cm x 120 cm x 50 cm
                     2009 / Work in  progress 

From treasured moments to treasured objects, our existence is encapsulated by the search for treasures, or for things to treasure. The installation, "Treasure is Everywhere", speaks of the motive force within us all, the energy and enthusiasm which motivates us, and which can also spread to illuminate other things.
 

 

 

Project:          just a game
Sculpture:      150 cm x 60 cm, material lead, aluminium 
                     2009

 

 

Project:          pendulum
Object:           700 cm, material lead
                     2009

 

 

Project:          lighthouse
Video:            04:00 min, PAL, loop
                     2009


 

 

Project:          300 miles
Sculpture:       500 cm, material recycled cards
                     2009

 

 

Project:          traffic police
Video:            01:47 min, PAL, loop
                     2008

An interpretation of two policemen on a street in Mexico.

  

 

Project:          la familia
Video:            01:50 min, PAL, loop
                     2009

The video „La Familia“ is a South American genre painting in which divers generations are united. With its light heartedness the picturesque family album contrasts the inner conflicts and the violence of its society. The artist in her study reminds of Martin Chambi, the pioneer of the Peruvian photography. For more than half century his atelier is the meeting point for all classes of society – beginning from a bagger to a mayor. As much as Chambi Vassileva succeeds to build up a close personal relationship to her actors, like you could see it before by the West African photographers Seidpu Keita and Mama Casset. The medium of photography loses its typical coldness and creates a kind of complicity between the artist and the object. (by Alfons Hug)


  

 

Project:          sin piel
Video:            03:47 min, PAL
                     2009

 

 

Project:          pedrito
Video:            03:00 min, ntsc
                     2009


 

 

Project:          broken man
Installation:    mirror work
                     2009

 

 

Project:          toro
Video:            05:00 min, PAL
                     2008

The video shows a man fighting against the waves of the sea - in face of the huge sky and the wide of the sea, sometimes he abandons the fight, but then he comes back with new bravery: as a torero in the arena but also as Don Qichote against the windmills.

 

 

Project:          die frau, die sich sieben mal gedreht hat
Sculpture:       45,5 cm x 8,5 cm, cast bronze
                     2007 

 

 

Project:          joey
Sculpture:       gypsum, artificial hair, mixed media
                      165 cm high
                      2007

Joey is a young woman standing upright, slim and with very long hair that veils large parts of her face and her body. Actually, one can only discern the nose, parts of mouth and forehead, the slender legs and the naked feet of the woman, the rest of her body is covered by her parted, chestnut brown hair. From the middle of the body, at about the area where the genital should be, the right thumb of the girl protrudes through the thick hair. It is gilded and it seems – at least at first sight – as if it wanted to imitate a phallus. This life-size sculpture appears like a general picture of the current situation in which the traditional but still existing images and conceptions concerning the relation between man and woman, art and science, as well as life and death have already dissolved.

 

 

Project:          aus der serie joey
Drawing:         25 cm x 35 cm, watercolor on paper
                      2007

 

 

 

Project:          nothing is just
Installation:    12cm x 1400 cm, Neon lights
                     2006

 

 

Project:          tango
Video:            00:45 min, PAL, loop
                     2007


 

 

Project:          reflections
Video:            05:14 min, PAL, 16:9
                     Ambient sound, electronic music by Atom Heart & Eyephone
                     2006

 

 

Project:          the milkmaid
Video:            03:00 min, PAL
                     Music: alva noto - taken from the op.2005 transrapid
                     Dominique Vellart
                     Actor - Maria Dabow
                     2006

This work was inspired by a painting by Jan Vermeer, the "The Milkmaid" from 1658-60. The motif becomes transformed, not only into our present but also into a virtual spaceless and timeless sphere. The clothing and appearance of the young woman are as pristine as the light that plays upon her - as it would an everlasting sculpture. However she is, through her posture, totally in the present. As she remains motionless and only the milk flows - as if frozen in time - one could say that in this work, photography, video and sculpture unite in one medium. 
/Ralf Bartholomäus/

 

 

Project:          journal
Video:            12:00 min, PAL, loop
                     1990-2005

I feel, therefore I am. In this regard, the skin acts as the frontier between the individual and our surroundings. Touch confirms our existence. “Through sight, through touch, through sympathy, through work in general we are with the others. All relationships are transitive. I touch an object and I see another person, but I am not that person. I am completely alone” .. extract from the book “The Time and the Other” from Emmanuel Levinas.

In the video "journal" I feel my way past various locations led by a different destination. I am both adult and child at the same time. This is a method not just of feeling, but also transforming the contour of the self. Our skin is a border crossing.

 

 

Project:          mirrorlight
Video:            08:00 min, PAL, loop
                     2004-2005 

With the mirrorlight you can move inside the human buildings. Some buildings have no windows, others are completely made of glass and still others have the shutters closed. Some are solidly built, others are temporary, like tents. I am permanently observing. The outer walls of the buildings which surround me are the inner walls of my home and I am somebody different. One can exchange everything in life except existence. During this existence we isolate ourselves. In this respect we are Monade. During the existence, and not during any kind of content, which could be in you, you are without doors and without windows.

When I blind the people with the mirror they are surprised. Maybe they think I am crazy. In fact many of them laugh, and then I am content.

 

  

Project:          jumping man
Video:            02:16 min, PAL, loop
                     2000-2005

One man in a black suit jumps under his own power. Every jump is an attempt to escape his routine. In doing so, he hopes to redefine himself and his experience. Contemporary society is full of Jumping Men and Jumping Women, who repeat their actions, hoping each time to perform them better. With each summersault they try to reach higher, or at least not fall short of the previous mark. And they hope to make it appear easy, though it is not.

 

 

Project:          definition
Video:            02:10 min, PAL, loop
                     2006

The video is immersed in existential yearning for the expanses of time and space. Out of the white landscape of snow comes a pair of bustling feet. The term DEFINITION appears, written is golden fluid in the snow. During this scene one can hear the sound of a cigarette-lighter striking and the ringing of a mobile telephone, with which the protagonist attempts in vain to reach someone...

Throughout the video one can see a beautiful bank of trees, which divide the image horizontally into earth and sky, into here and there, then and now, into the experienced and not yet experienced, perceived space, situation, state of being. As the view pans from left to right one hears a sound like a helicopter slowly separating and raising itself from the land. Then: silence, white screen, wind, the far away sound of birds singing in the wild. As the video ends you hear a dog barking, very close, beside you. Despite this pastoral idol one still perceives the urban nature of every video sequence - the pathological restlessness.

 

 

Project:          time cut

 

 

Project:          cloudsdefinition


 

 

Project:          speedformel
Sculpture:       80 cm x 400 cm x 50 cm, bronze
                     2004-2007

The work speedformel thematizes Mariana Vassileva’s experiences after emigrating to a new living environment. She creates a sculpture, in which the speed of time and the impossibility to grasp one’s surroundings and one’s fellow humans in all their real meaning and all their true shape are materialised in a dynamic form. The distortion and alienation of the experiences are expressed the sculpture’s deformations. The literally embodied time bears a hole in its middle: the longing for rooms dreamt of, in which we never were, and at the same time the feeling of loss towards the places in which we once lived and which we had to leaved behind, without having recognised what they mean to us.

With speedformel, Vassileva succeeds in creating a sculpture, which is so heavy and profound as the feelings it formulates, while simultaneously the rushing time congeals into a fluent, nearly ephemeral form. 

 

 

Project:          rasender stillstand

The bus stop modified by Mariana Vassileva was originally a part of her exhibition "Rasender Stillstand" (static motion). At that time the bus stop was senselessly placed in a former schoolyard on Berlin's Auguststraße, causing confusion.This is the effect that the artist hopes for: using something very familiar and perceiving it's features and qualities as if we see it for the first time. For a long time now we have attempted to settle down in big cities but nevertheless we remain on the road.

Perhaps we are still gipsies in spite of our dependence on permanent residences. We never feel truly secure. We try to run away; to flee from ourselves. If something forces us to stop, perhaps to wait for something, we immediately search for things to provide us the comfort we loose through our restlessness.

With her work the artist underlines her interest in contemporary problems, such as the feeling of remaining a stranger even in intimate situations. She is concerned with our longing for a home environment, exploring our forced mobility as well as the pathological restlessness of our time. Her work is occupied with the possibility of discovering a sense of peace and safety even while we are abroad or travelling whilst also exploring the opposite effect of feeling lost in the most common und familiar situations. The placement of the bus stop denies every association with movement: it is certain no bus will stop here. The bus stop has been slightly but significantly manipulated. The seats resemble a bed, implying regained silence and a letter box creates an atmosphere of privacy and confidence. With such little changes a concrete moment - the "now" - is almost within reach.

An isle of peace, completely still, amongst the madness of speed we experience in our present. Those two little changes are enough to slow down an object usually understood as a symbol of mobility. In this variation the bus stop (already regarded as a classical work in Berlin Wall AG´s programme) is perfected. By subtle modifications a common object becomes an art-work enriched with various associations. The simplicity almost painfully contrasts our usual lack of moderation. Being sheer and pure is what makes this work of art so beautiful. 
/Ralf Bartholomäus/

 

 

Mariana Vassileva

Mariana Vassileva

Mariana Vassileva

Mariana Vassileva