Erik Mátrai (1977) presents a solo show at aqb Project Space, featuring his new paintings on canvas and paper from the last 3-4 years. Their central motif: the ellipse. It is not only in Mátrai’s images
that the meaning of the geometric shape has implications beyond mere geometry: due to the elliptic orbit of planets and other celestial bodies, it is loaded with the majestic mysticity of the universe.

Baroque art had a predilection for elliptic shapes; their use, in addition to being considered a feat of masterful engineering, became interpreted as the symbol and representation of a dual, at once anthropo- and theocentric world, one of the main characteristics of the shape being its bifocal construction. The other important focal point of Erik Mátrai’s exhibition is the examination of the colour scale, the optical effect of pure colours. Mostly sprayed in acrylic paint, the artist’s ellipses often explore the interaction of colours in complementary image pairs with dark and light backgrounds.

The intensity of the paintings is enhanced by Mátrai’s use of unmixed, pure colours in his compositions, the physical juxtaposition or layering of which gives rise to new shades.

The exhibition organically and consistently continues Erik Mátrai’s artistic program, which centres on articulating a correlation between physical phenomena and transcendentality by means of contemporary art. In both the artist’s canvas- and paper-based paintings, this field of research is combined with numerous exciting hybrid variations of ellipses and colour theory. As a special extra, installative interactions by the artist duo Lőrinc Borsos will also be on display at the exhibition space, employing Erik Mátrai’s ellipse stencils found at their shared studio as their “raw material”.
http://www.erikmatrai.com
http://borsoslorinc.com