Palkó Tibor: Honnan tudjuk, hogy nem álmodunk (2)

Short listing

An exhibition resurrected from the original WordPress archive of the Godot Gallery.

Full exhibition text

Szöknie was required.

The Godot Gallery warmly invites you.

Tibor Palkó

How do we know we're not dreaming (2)

for its exhibition titled, where we exhibit the gallery artist's newest paintings.

Opening: 14 May 2015 · 20:00

Opening: L. Simon László, writer

and

Nagy Mózes, performer, clarinet solo

Open for viewing until June 13 during the gallery’s opening hours, from Tuesday to Friday between 9 and 14, and on Saturday from 10 to 13.

Elevated illusion

Pataki Gábor

How do we know we're not dreaming…

excerpt…

Their subjects – workers, bearded women, demon‑like faces with crimson lips – live among us, face us on the street, but on the other side, aliens turned into human bodies, cyborgs, with metal streaks occasionally sloughing off from beneath their transplanted skin. Blood drips from the eye socket, the pear hanging on the branch has turned into poison, the little girl resting in her mother's arms has donned a zombie suit.

These images can be read as manifestations of the horror lurking beneath the apparently orderly surface, the terror concealed beneath the disturbed skin and the manifestations of disorder. Even in the seemingly serene and calm small towns of American thrillers, hell is unleashed at any moment; the devil can torture the well‑situated, apartment‑dwelling, cocktail‑sipping citizens who lurk beside their pools, or the citizens themselves may become it. So why would it be any different on Europe’s poorer side, among people who grunt, are tired, and barely able to process their ventures and their emotions? History and politics, driven by a voluntarist comfort, have shaken and still shake these towns and their inhabitants, so it is no surprise that smiles are distorted, and it is rare to find a wardrobe from which skeletons can be removed at any time.

However, there is also another interpretation of Palkó’s paintings. Palkó Tibor, after all, does not view everyday life from the outside. As an external observer he would obviously paint precise accounts, yet despite every contrary claim, Palkó is the son of the multitude; he does not pick, but he is a member of the narrower and wider – Nagykáti, Jászberényi, European – community. Among those with us are the workers, the hard‑headed women, the lipstick demons. That we sometimes truly appear as zombies, cyborgs, puppets dragged along by a wire is not his doing, but the fault of reality. After all, why would he lie? He could – for if he wished – paint charmingly, enchantingly, and could package the cheerful thing into dazzling, sparkling paper. A few unintentionally left‑over details prove that if necessary, he could virtuously sketch or conjure fine colour transitions. Yet instead he apparently lets paint drip freely, with relaxed nonchalance, ignoring anatomy, harmony, and regular composition, creating too thick lips, eyes asymmetrically positioned on the face, impossible spatial situations. He almost piles onto the canvas motifs that do not fit, the unexpected situations. Emitt pierces in a limb, through which an eye protrudes, just as a flyer darts.

They live in a state of cheerfulness.

In a word, he paints pictures that resemble this Hungarian world: asymmetrical, irregular, raw, fragmented, rough, and full of sparse, orphan‑like shapes. His perspective is not merely ruthless and unrepentant, but also drenched in sympathy, understanding and insight. He shows, but does not judge; he criticises, yet without ill‑will. He looks upon his figures, rather than looking down upon them, and his quiet, autonomous transcendence radiates not only from the woman‑shaped aspects of his finished large canvases, but also from his other works.

It is no coincidence that after the question in the exhibition title, there is not a question mark, but three dots…

How do we know we're not dreaming?

Press contact