Juliana Do
- Michael Hanna
- 14 hours ago
- 2 min read
Juliana Do is a painter and sculptor who has exhibited across Europe. Recent exhibitions include Center for Openness and Dialogue in Tirana Albania, Kuenstlerhaus, Otto Mauer Center, and Theatre Odeon in Vienna, HilbertRaum in Berlin, and dual shows at Gallery Salvatore in Tirol, Austria. Her works remain in private and public collections in China and across Europe. Juliana has been published by Contributions from Science, Art and Society Hardcover by André Karliczek, ARTPROFIL magazine, Terra incognita Cataloguem in World views - world experiences by Sabine Zimmermann-Törne, an exhibition of the university collections, and Art + Technology in cooperation with the Institute for Cartography of TU Dresden.
Ranging from optical illusory paintings which have reflective effects with incorporation of goldleaf to sculptures resembling swarms of butterflies, Juliana’s defining characteristic would be her use of color. Not just any colors, but bold pastels and neons which have a New Wave but contemporary connotation with no familiarity with nature or tradition. These magical paintings such as the Luminous series represent intricate abstracted patterns which incorporate complex design elements such as lines, big and small, or inner circles resembling the rings around Saturn or a supernova.
The OP Color series, similar to Luminous and Luminous Round, remains amongst her most signature works which reflect abstractions into unfamiliar territory by using color combinations which are rather bold and experimental in nature. Her works combining gold leaf remain some of her most interesting pieces and her Butterflies series of sculptures take the concept of swarms to new levels. These Butterflies appear metallic and turned into streaks of luminosity, rather than resembling living creatures. Juliana takes the design structure of a butterfly to construct interesting design elements which reflect a consistent metallic sheen also represented in her paintings.
Silver Light (pictured above) remains a relief sculpture of a swarm of butterflies flattened out within a structure. The butterflies appear more like mechanical constructs with their luminous metallic shine rather than organic insects reflecting deep, intuitive design principles. These series of works represent a deeper aesthetic in what would otherwise be familiar subject matter, reflecting fantastical connotations with the invocation of swarms. A single butterfly remains outside the composition, revealing the sculpture as an installation as well.
Juliana Do remains a dynamic artist who explores the purpose of surface and optical illusions with complex applications of paint and metal. Her varied techniques and intricate style reveals an artist dedicated to the nuance of her craft to emphasize maximum expression and illusory reflection. Through a sophisticated palette, installation-like representations, and unusual forms which represent supernova-like tendencies and swarms, she recreates hidden aspects of the imagination which becomes revealed with her bold works. An investigative artist, Juliano Do conveys an evolutionary change in painting beyond pure abstraction and into purpose-driven design which reflect hallucinogenic colors and motion blurs. Her sculptures equally emit a sense of turning metallics into harbingers of light which manipulate the science of optics through reflection and tone. Juliana represents an approach to her paintings and sculptures which deepen the structure of planes of surface beyond simplicity and into complicated realms which command a room with their sophisticated universes of optical illusory structures.
