RAFKA: Interference @ IMAGO Gallery
Actively producing works, RAFKA is an emerging Swiss artist, living and working in Zürich, one of the most prevalent cultural centres of Switzerland. The artist has found his creative passion through the array of colours and vivid pigments available on the market to handle and combine. The use of colour in RAFKA’s paintings is unique, still evolving across developed studies and current experimentation in the artist’s short career. The combination of vibrant tones with a metallic sheen, instates a unique watermark on the artists developing style. Solo show Interference, exhibited at IMAGO Gallery, directly delves into the artists creative production. The exhibition occupies the entirety of the exhibition space, allowing the emerging Swiss artist the opportunity to showcase different periods of his work across different studies of colour and texture.
RAFKA, Interference, 2024. Installation View. Photo Courtesy: IMAGO Gallery.
RAFKA’s ambition to turn his mundane discoveries into works of art gradually developed into the creation of his first bodies of work. By making his own pigments, the artist is able to create unique textures and shades of paint which characterise his dynamically vibrant works. The distinguishing feature of RAFKA’s work is the glistening of the pigments, reflecting light, and progressively changing colour as the viewer wanders around the piece and within the exhibition space.
RAFKA, Interference, 2024. Installation View. Photo Courtesy: IMAGO Gallery.
“I don’t get my colours in any store. All colours are unique mixtures of different raw materials. I develop new shades by first creating colour studies. In addition, the mixing process is essential for me to achieve the desired quality of the colours with their different intensity of light reflection.”
- RAFKA
RAFKA, 2024. Artist in Atelier. Photo Courtesy: RAFKA.
Across the artist’s innovative attitude and passion for painting, he started to develop his most technical approach in recent years. Present within the paintings there is an interplay in textures, from thick dollops of dripped paint to transparent strokes of colour. The transparency resembles the strength within the technique of watercolours, tinting the surface with the applied colour, whilst maintaining the pattern on the layer bellow. The overlay of colour constructs depth within the works whilst creating new vibrant tones and blends of colour. The combination between sheen and sparkle of the pigments, alludes to the unique finishing silk texture of the works.
RAFKA, Interference, 2024. Installation View. Photo Courtesy: IMAGO Gallery.
IMAGO Gallery was originally founded in London, the fulcrum of artistic and creative international talent, pursuing to become a leading space abroad in the representation of Italian art and originating artists. In 2011 the gallery re-located to Lugano, Switzerland in continuum to its dedication of research in emerging talent in the contemporary art scenario. The gallery space is unordinary, as all surfaces, unlike the standardised “white cube gallery”, are black. This distinctive feature compliments the exhibition, as the bright colours contrast with the dark background. The space creates an intimate surrounding for the viewer, allowing the public to contemplate the pieces on display without distractions.
Interference, the title of the exhibition, is interpreted as the artist’s intervention on the canvas through the use of cosmetic resembling colours. The coated pigments, reflect the light differently according to altered factors – the viewpoint of the audience, the direction in which the paint was applied, the texture of the pigment and the position of the light source – influencing the perception of colour and depth. Therefore, the dynamic interplay between the light and the canvas also acts as an interference between these two elements, changing the perception of the painting by the viewer depending on where their perspective
Introducing two styles, the exhibition features pieces produced during two distinct periods in RAFKA’s artistic career: a first period devoted to polychromatic works and a second period, which serves as the culmination of his new body of work, devoted to monochromatic works that shift in colour depending on the angle at which they are viewed. Therefore, the distinct styles appear in conversation merging the original study of pigments across vibrant textures and dynamic brushstrokes and the recent artistic development composed by larger applications of blended monochromatic pigments. Apparent historical references are recognisable in both currents of RAFKA’s work, such as Jackson Pollock’s dripping technique in his early paintings and Mark Rothko’s colour field paintings, in the artist’s more recent works.
RAFKA, Fiore (Flower), 2024. Acrylic on canvas, 200 x 160cm. Photo Courtesy: IMAGO Gallery.
RAFKA, Acquarello (Watercolour), 2024. Acrylic on canvas, 200 x 160cm. Photo Courtesy: IMAGO Gallery.
Present in the exhibition, Fuchsia demonstrates the second style of the artist across a monochromatic painting using different shades of magenta, fuchsia and pink. The use of similar shades creates a monochromatic effect whilst maintaining a multichromatic texture within the work. Moreover, to colours in this painting were all created by the artist and mixed amongst pigment blends to achieve a vibrant array of reflections and colour depths on the surface of the canvas. Amongst this work both sparkling and silky elements, given by the different pigments, are visible to the light. This texture is described by RAFKA as a “marble effect”.
RAFKA, Fuchsia, 2024. Acrylic on canvas, 160 x 120cm. Photo Courtesy: IMAGO Gallery.
RAFKA, Orchid, 2024. Acrylic on canvas, 200 x 160cm. Photo Courtesy: IMAGO Gallery.
RAFKA’s solo exhibition, Interference, researches colour, texture and light. Across the artist’s experimentation in creating his own pigments from raw materials and fine cosmetic products, he creates unique colour formulations which once applied to the canvas react differently to light. The interplay between colour and light also poses a contrast as these two factors interfere with each other developing the depth and final appearance of the painting.
RAFKA’s solo exhibition Interference will be on display at IMAGO Gallery in Lugano, Switzerland until 27 April 2024.
Grace Jamieson Bianciardi
Reviews Co-Editor, MADE IN BED