David Maljkovic

David Maljkovic’s (1973, Rijeka, HR) oeuvre focuses on the historical artistic legacy of modernism, his own work and art in general. Maljkovic often researches the past in order to imagine the future: he often re-evaluates his existing artworks for the sake of progress, which lends an ever-developing nature to his works on view. The series “Alterity Line” expands upon his practice of reconfiguring and re-presenting his earlier works into site-specific installations. The intricate transformation of works from various stages of his practice into new ones functions to obfuscate hierarchies between media and artworks, considering the relationship between art’s autonomy and its formal developments, the nature of the gaze and the complexities of time. The series consists in thirteen new monochromatic paintings mounted on aluminum hang, each laser-etched with small drawings, many that Maljkovic found in his old sketchbooks. Referring to the production of these works, he exhibits inside vitrines three utilitarian grates that the mounted canvases were placed on during the laser-etching process. In another series, Maljkovic, who began his career studying painting in Zagreb, presents his old paintings rolled and encased in plexiglas boxes that lay across trestles or lean against the wall.