Ivan Stojakovic

Mining Fool's Gold

Volta Art Fair NYC

September 4 - 8, 2024 Chelsea Industrial, NYC

Curated by: Cheryl Molnar

"I create my work to be seen as a bird's eye view expedition overviewing human impact on Earth’s environment. The result is an unearthing of the Anthropocene. My paintings, sculptures and dioramas explore environmental issues such as plastic consumption, loss and reclaiming of wild habitats, and representations of Nature modified through digital remix and AI prompts. My work challenges viewer perception of what is natural and what is manmade, and asks the questions of value.

In my studio, I explore painting, collaging and sculpting with found industrial materials and with organic natural materials. I deeply engage with the process of multilayered integration and I strive to create rich and deep sensory experiences for the viewers to explore. Through a constructivist mixed media process, I build metaphors that serve as environmentally themed narrative possibilities. When working in this way, I naturally work the fine line between abstraction and representation."
— Ivan Stojakovic

How is your work ecological?

In my work, I create metaphorical meanings of ecological issues and parables that explore consumer desire in the context of living environment. For example: the idea behind Mining Fool’s Gold was to stage a visual metaphor centered around the meaning of misguided pursuits and human exploits of the Earth. The work connects the natural source with the man-made target while various meanings emerge in the possible readings, including reference to post human excavations, also present in the Extraction series.

Your main medium has been painting. How does your painting relate to the ecological theme?

In Blue vs Blue series of paintings, I repurpose plastic bags by compressing them into bird's eye views of terrains impregnated with microplastic and plastic sediments. In this process, I merge references to early maps with references to satellite images, and I merge drone views of primordial wilds with bird’s eye views of human-altered Earth. Some of my influences further include geological displays, sublime landscapes throughout the history of painting, and landscape design and architecture. I choose to fossilize one of the most iconic signifiers of our fossil fuel era – the mass produced plastic bags. My paintings comment on the permanency of plastic, and on the fact that it is part of Nature. I present my paintings to the viewer in a design conscious form of a serene and sublime natural beauty. This contradiction between design and environmental activism is a driving force in my work. In this way, my work further examines the complex and controversial nature of human desire as a driving force behind our consumerism and behind our environmental actions.