Peter Pollág, the creator of the Danubiana symbol and the monumental sculpture entitled Dunajské krídla (Danube Wings) which is located at the tip of the peninsula and welcomes every Danubiana visitor, returns to this amazing museum on the banks of the Danube with a grandiose selection of his works. The reason for his presentation is not only to celebrate 20 years of his art, but another event of historical, political, social, and strictly personal importance, the hundredth anniversary of the end of World War I, which is once again highly topical among them.
No one questions Pollág’s status as one of the most noteworthy contemporary Slovak painters. His works and exhibition projects at home and abroad always attract spectators looking for a space for meditation and contemplation.
Peter Pollág is an excellent colorist. His paintings immediately demonstrate his explosive colorfulness and bold gestures. However, a closer look reveals a distinct network of lines and coordinates creating the floor plan for the plotting and modeling of the skeletons of his figures. It is a thoughtful and rationally perceived “topography of the terrain”, his personal and mysterious coordinates of space and time on the map of life. They appear in the form of distinctive, mostly black relief drawing, as a negative imprint in a color mass, and fine hatching in the layers of colorful pastes.
Pollág is also an exceptional figure painter, poet and story teller. He creates paintings that speak to you, surprise you, stun you and force you to stop and think. They are expressive and imaginative, dynamic and mysterious, full of motion. Only a closer look reveals that even the most noteworthy of them is hidden in their depth, in a spiritual dimension of thought, sealed in color and paint and the surface of the painting like a magical code which reveals the essence of things and phenomena, uncovers layers of time and unfolds thousands of stories. Pollág interprets them with unusual certainty through the unique power of metaphor and symbol, the magic and poetics of imagination, and the rough expressiveness and bottomless depth of drama.
Mária Horváthová
Born on 19 February 1958 in Levoča.
From 1977 to 1983 he studied at the Academy of Fine Arts in Bratislava. Later he complemented his studies at the Accademia di Belle Arti Pietro Vanucci in Perugia (1980), the Academy of Fine Arts in Prague (1984 – 1989), the École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux Arts in Paris (1986 – 1987) and at the Facultad de Bellas Artes at Universidad Complutense de Madrid (1988). He taught at the Academy of Fine Arts in Bratislava (1983 – 1990). Since 1990 he has focused on creative work.
The artist has had a great number of solo and joint exhibitions and his works can be found in public and private collections on four continents. He has participated in many symposia and creative stays including in France, Zimbabwe, Zambia, China, Mexico, Israel, Italy, Greece, Ethiopia and Iran. He has been awarded a number of prestigious awards at home and abroad for his work.
He lives in Bratislava and creates small-size and monumental paintings, drawings, graphic prints, book illustrations and sculptures.
