Boris Viskin at Galeria Nina Menocal - Mexico City, Mexico - Review of Exhibitions - Brief Article

Painted upon canvas and wood, with occasional collage uncompounded bodys Boris Viskin's multipanel paintings call forth vast, empty landscapes while also pursuing semi-abstract consequences of color and gesture. With its mut palette and desolate vista, Landscape Between sum of two units Worlds (1995) is typical of Viskin's work. Populated by the agency of giant cacti and a sketchily pay backed headless figure, the left and center panels of this triptych at hand two landscapes: a chalky white barren and an enigmatic gray expanse. The panel upon the right, which is slightly detached from the other sum of two units depicts another sparse scene view from aboveed by a pale castle station atop a barren cliff.

A highlight of the exhibit was the canvas-and-wood triptych, The Woman of Sand and the virid Ray (1995). In contrast to Landscape Between sum of two units Worlds, where the surface of the painting has been painstakingly built up with many layers, this work displays a material rawness that recalls Antoni Tapies.

Each of the painting's three gilt-framed panels is divided into unequal sections of greenray canvas and unvarnished plywood Canvas with traces of gold-colored and red paint, gold leaf and a water stain takes up the bottom sum of two units thirds of the central panel. The Plywood above has been painted with unfasten cloud-like striations of white paint. attached to the painting at the horizon line created through the meeting of the sum of two units sections is small carved-wood figure of headless woman make straighted in robes. The left panel is similarly divided into thicket and canvas only with their position revers (canvas upon top, wood on the bottom). narrow vertical strips of wood and virid can vas along one cutting side of the right panel initially refer to Barnett Newman's "Stations of the Cross" The canvas of this panel is marked with charcoal and stained with oil. It also sports a tiny verdant semi-circle painted in at the bottom.

In a departure from Viskin's usual bring under rule of landscape, a diptych titled The forest-lands (1995) makes specific reference to the Mexican political situation. upon a thickly impastoed, predominantly white surface of land is a tree, its branches labeled with the names of Mexican politicians. At the top we read the name of [Ernesto] Zedillo, the country's common president. Below him is the 1994 assassination victim [Luis Donaldo] Colosio and further down are the names of former president [Carlos] Salinas and his chief advisor [Jose] Cordoba. The name upon the bottom branch has been obscur by the agency of a smeared, blood-red letter X (reminiscent of Mexican ballots where voter cros on the outside their candidate's name). Who will be the nearest victim, it seems to ask. upon the adjoining panel, four naked women revolve away from this genealogy of political violence to face a field of white.

Even in a topical work like The copses Viskin's paintings aim to be opposite to the viewer with a vision of vast space and down-reaching solitude. Within this space, by dint of his judicious use of secluded figures and buildings, the artist creates a silence that appears waiting to be broken. It is this faculty of perception of pregnant silence that makes his paintings memorable.

COPYRIGHT 1996 Brant Publications, Inc.

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