The National Gallery / Sofia Arsenal – Museum of Contemporary Art
presents
PINK LIGHT
Adelina Popnedeleva
Curator: Nadezhda Dzhakova
18 October–2 December 2018
Opening on Thursday, 18 October, at 6 p. m.
SAMCA, 2, Cherni Vrah Blvd.
‘Pink Light’ is an exhibition of the conventional view of the woman and its juxtaposing through metaphorical means. Adelina Popnedeleva turns to her childhood memories and to fairy tales, as well as social stereotypes, to include in her visual narrative her thoughts and feelings of a woman who daily overcomes dogmas.
The exhibition presents works from the artist’s earliest projects—selected performances, photographs and installations, including ‘Symptom’, ‘Alchemy’, ‘Nirvana’—to her latest creations for the museum space that are dedicated to the female role in the past and present.
Employing familiar subject matter by intertwining symbolic images of inner states and engaging the public in the performative action of hidden metaphors, Adelina Popnedeleva evokes a lasting feeling that these themes are still painful for our society. In the transition from past to present, it is the eternal love of a woman for her relatives, her loyalty and dedication, but also her pain of selflessness, the sense of weakness and feeling lost, and, as the artist implies, even a hidden protest, that endure.
A neon sign, ‘Do Not Expect Too Much of the End of the World’, taken from textual street graffiti, is lit up in pink. The colour symbolises the hope that the world can be ‘cleared’ of negative accumulations and relaunched. From it, light is emitted radiating promises, but when we begin reading the text, we discover hidden doubts and disappointments.
This is the third exhibition in the Autobiography Project of the Museum’s programme on documenting contemporary art. Without being retrospective in nature, the goal of the project is to focus on names and works that changed our art from the 1990s to the present.
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Adelina Popnedeleva works in the fields of video art, performance, installation and photography. She was born in 1956 in Sofia, where she lives and works. She graduated in 1988 from the National Academy of Arts in Sofia. In 2008, she was awarded a doctoral degree in Art Studies and Fine Arts at the National Art Academy, where she has been Associate Professor since 2012. In 2008, she received the Gaudenz B. Ruf Award for New Bulgarian Art in the Advanced Artists category. She was awarded an honorary diploma for the documentary film ‘Fresh’ at the 18th Golden Rhyton Bulgarian Documentary and Animation Film Festival, 2010.
For further information:
Nadezhda Dzhakova: 0879 834 030