Eugene Zaremba. somme Automatic translate

Erarta Museum presents an exhibition of Evgeny Zaremba, whose paintings reveal hidden natural processes that are inaccessible to the eye.

The name of the exhibition refers us to volcanology, where the somma is the remains of an ancient volcano destroyed by an explosive eruption, which form a ring around a younger crater. The term comes from the Somma volcano located around the summit of Vesuvius. The exhibition at the Erarta Museum of Contemporary Art will feature over 25 works created over the past few years.

Painting and graphics by Yevgeny Zaremba are not just exquisite decorative compositions, strict rhythms and subtle color combinations. The artist has a high level of symbolic and abstract thinking. Harmony is achieved in an effort to combine the poetics of symbols with the logic of purely pictorial solutions - in the construction of the composition and in the use of color.

The main character trait of Yevgeny Zaremba is curiosity, leading to continuous development. The artist strives to go deeper and wider, and, as he himself admits, he tries to visualize hidden, inaccessible natural processes, moving further and further away from a clear image of reality. The author does not consider his work abstract: he says that he does not fantasize, but, on the contrary, turns into matter, examines its different facets - his painting is more realistic than any landscape. He looks like a scientist who knows the world at the quantum level.

It all started with observations and experiments: even at the institute, the artist was bored with depicting reality. One can observe the constant evolution of Zaremba’s path. At first, he experimented with signs and symbols, in addition to painting, sculpting and creating art objects. Then the author turned to semi-abstract landscapes, which the viewer could see in Erarta in 2012, at the first solo exhibition. In these works, the artist’s impressions of traveling to exotic places were guessed. Behind the outward lightness, the most complex work was visible: the paintings abounded in layers of the finest color shades. The artist did not stop at the commercial success of this series: his painting has changed and does not stop changing, while remaining recognizable.

Today, Evgeny Zaremba continues to experiment, creating textured canvases using film (several similar works are also presented at the Somma exhibition). He calls his main fear the possibility of mothballing, stopping in creative development at a certain point and starting to reproduce what was once successfully found. The airless, fluid and smooth forms of the current stage of the author’s work are reminiscent of the large-scale geological processes of the Archean era, when the floor was really lava and giant volcanoes erupted for millions of years in a row. The "red ribbon" of life was once born in their hot water.

Eugene grew up in the north of the Omsk region, surrounded by forests, and the mountains remained for him only an unattainable childhood dream. Only closer to the age of forty, he first visited the Altai mountains, going to sketches with other artists who painted from nature. Zaremba also laid out the colors and, looking at the landscape, to everyone’s surprise, began to paint abstractions.

Despite being in demand, the artist leads a closed lifestyle, far from bohemian. For several years he has been living in the center of St. Petersburg, where he moved from Novosibirsk with his family in the company of two gray cats. He is interested in the world, current artistic processes and the work of his contemporaries. Acutely reacting to what is happening around, he translates everything that happens into his characteristic language - from the exciting beauty of St. Petersburg to shocking news.