THE MEMORY OF MATTER
Artist Name
Irina Pătășanu
Artist Statement
For me, painting is a way of giving form to things that are difficult to define such as emotions, relationships, moments of introspection and the subtle ways in which we experience the world around us.
My work moves intuitively between figuration and abstraction. I am interested in simplifying rather than describing, reducing figures and forms to what feels essential and leaving space for ambiguity. Faces may remain undefined, gestures become more important than identity, and familiar forms are often transformed through colour, texture and composition.
I rarely begin with the intention of telling a complete story. Instead, I allow a painting to develop through layers, contrasts and instinctive decisions, responding to what emerges on the canvas. This process leaves room for uncertainty and for meanings that are not predetermined.
I want my paintings to feel open rather than resolved, to create a space in which the viewer can recognise something of their own experience, without being told exactly what to see or feel.
Exhibition Statement
The Memory of Matter explores the idea that memory exists not only within us, but inside the material world itself.
Across the works, human and organic forms begin to mirror one another. Branches echo veins, roots resemble anatomical networks, and layers of earth and wood become traces of time. These visual parallels blur the boundary between body and nature, suggesting that both carry histories shaped by growth, experience and transformation.
Moving between figuration and abstraction, the paintings explore what is held beneath the visible surface. Human figures appear without fixed identities, allowing intimacy, vulnerability and connection to emerge beyond individual narratives. In the natural forms, memory takes on a physical presence, accumulated in layers, fractures, textures and marks.
Rather than presenting humanity and nature as separate subjects, The Memory of Matter proposes a shared visual language: one shaped by growth, vulnerability, connection and time.
What remains is not always visible. Sometimes it survives as a trace, a texture, a fracture or a form; quietly held within the matter itself.
