Macedonia, Faculty of Fine Arts in Skopje
Spring 2014 Program Participant
Final Project Statement “Fallen Victory”
Nike of Samotrache is a 2nd-century BC marble sculpture of the Greek goddess Nike (Victory). It conveys a sense of action and triumph, and is seen as an iconic depiction of triumphant spirit and of the divine momentarily coming face to face with man; with her hands and head missing, increasing the monumental presence of a force hardly terrestrial.
Starting from a work that symbolizes an idea; the idea of Victory, with an anthropomorphic structure- a woman in her movement against the wind, which is presented in aclosedform ( an idea materialized in marble), of beauty and movement. The meaning of my Fallen Victory is found in the change of the structure and the material: the idea of the closed form transforms into an idea of an open form, so that the sculpture becomes incorporeal and transparent.
The air and the movement both pass through the sculpture itself, which still has a body and wings, but they are presented into an ever-present space (transparency), because of the material and the process of making itself; Per se, the new sense of the Suggestion. The space is ubiquitous; the sculpture suggests a silhouette and a drawing, and that space is here present from all sides and it penetrates the silhouette horizontally and vertically.
The idea of the full and the empty has changed completely from that of the antiquity.
The empty space dominates, and the drawing web is the main visual and aesthetic sensation.
The Triumph of the Past, in our contemporaneity, sees the Victory and the Defeat in the same way.
“Retreat from Reality” 6-week Project Unit:
Work-in-Progress from first studio exercise “Sight, Site & Seriality”
Intro Unit, Week 3: “Tempo Zulu” Project
For the third and final week of the intro unit, for her “Tempo Zulu Project” Elena focused on the subject of the sun, her project was not very well presented or well thought out, but a project with potential.
Intro Unit, Week 2: “Mapping and Archiving” Project
For her Mapping & Exploring Project in week 2, Elena created a collage of painting, drawing, found materials in a large sketchbook format, inspired by the connections of the art and spaces in Siena to her artistic heritage from Macedonia (blue and gold)
Work by Elena Chemerska
Intro Unit, Week 1: “Out of the Gates” Project
In the first week of the program, for her “Out of the Gates” project, Elena responded to the location of Porta Laterina with a collection of sketchbook drawings using charcoal, conte, etc creating a bold series of dynamic drawings.
