By Amanda Lee Anderson
On August 22 at the Allen R. Hite Art Gallery, Boris Zakic, a painting faculty member at Georgetown College, opened his exhibition “Translations”, an exhibit of large-scale paintings and preliminary studies. In these pieces, Zakic explores the boundaries between text and painting, and the confines between objective and subjective representation.
Zakic studied painting in Yugoslavia, where he was born, and completed his Masters of Fine Arts at the University of New Orleans. During graduate school, Zakic described his experience as full of “intensive conceptualization. I used to rationalize every little part of the artistic experience, as if art for me turned into accounting, where everything had to add up.”
He spent time trying to translate themes into communicable terms, because the public’s conception of art came predominantly from translations into text, slides, and photographs. This art show explores the tension between text and images as a means of functional communication.
The paintings are similar to a contact sheet, with the Kodak brand name and negative number obvious along the edges of the canvas. They are also precisely realistic, giving the appearance of a real photo with text imposed on it. All the figures in the paintings are blinded or bound by the slides meant to contain them. They are meant to demonstrate that the figures are bound within the confines of the photographic slides and therefore dominated by what the photograph shows, since photography is perceived as an objective art, portraying an image that is real rather than one that is subjective when portrayed by a painter.
Zakic’s show will remain at the Hite Art Gallery until September 29. The artist will be there on Thursday, September 12, at 5:30 pm. He will lecture on his paintings and give a gallery tour. A free reception is to follow. For more information, contact John Begley, gallery director, at 852-4483.
