May 30

Nena Lang

Nena Lang (Cirkovic) is a contemporary abstract artist who has exhibited across Europe since 2020 in countries including Slovenia, Austria, Spain, Germany, and Croatia. She has participated in a number of art fairs such as Art Expo in New York and Antalya, Turkey as well as the International Fair of Modern & Contemporary Art in Marbella, Spain. Recent art fairs include XIV Biennale Florence, Italy, Moon Art Fair in Hamburg, Italy and Art Expo Ljubljana, Slovenia.

The works are palette knife paintings executed by acrylic on canvas with psychologically or metaphorically driven titles such as Sonnet of Life and Ocean of Memories. Color palette may vary from pastel, bright, neon, or dark neutral tones. These fragmented abstractions appear almost as if peering through severely broken glass at a body of water or a designed painting created on glass and then smashed. The shattered type of appearance creates a heightened sense of visual stimulation. Outside of the circular type paintings there remains no compositional elements or forms, as the works are bodies of color smeared consistently in patterns in an equilibrium across the surface. Instead of forms, what we may see are planes of paint in careful controlled smears across the canvas.

As we observe Nena’s circular paintings such as Power of Love (pictured above) and Kaleidoscope of Life (pictured below), these focused pieces revolve around spiraled designs with clear cut compositions unlike her purely abstracted works. The circles are propped up so close to the surface in a way which they appear off the canvas and overlay each other to create diamond compositions. With an array of invigorating colors and high contrast, these dizzyingly clever works draw our attention almost like peering through a tunnel, or as indicated with one of the titles, a kaleidoscope. While Power of Love remains forceful and dominant with up close circles with darkened tones and deep, rich blacks, Kaleidoscope of Life comes off more playful with more distant circles and bolder colors coming off more like a festival or carnival.

Nena Lang remains a zestful and energetic painter who plays both on optical illusions or emphasizing the flatness of surface. These heavily rich, complex abstractions express a great degree of control over paint and a deep understanding of surface and texture. Her palette knife strokes come off as highly geometric and a design with themselves outside of color, hue, form, and composition. There remains an almost relief sculptural sense to the paintings as the thickness of the flat paint behaves in planes which overlay each other. Although the relief of planes are more of an optical illusion rather than reality as these are clearly flat paintings with strong texture. Nena teaches the audience contemporary art can still be highly expressive without alluding to earlier eras of art. There remains no modernistic tendencies in the paintings as they have a veneer of abstract design rather than pure, meaningful improvisation. The paintings almost appear planned and formulated in the mind before execution and implored with precision and control. These objective-based energized abstract paintings give off a refreshing and inspiring take on color manipulation as well as a defining purpose to hue and pattern.