MIRRORED (XVII)
Rad Husak
Pigment Transfer and Carbon Pencil on Sandblasted Aluminium
56 x 40 cm
2021
Edition of 1 AP’s on Ethereum
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Rad Husak is inherently a process-driven artist. Based in London and fresh from graduating with a Masters from the Royal College of Art, his practice is firmly situated in the expanded field of print. Through intensive research and experimentation, Husak has come to hew out his own process - defining the technique of the pigment transfer twinned with carbon-drawn elements, on sandblasted aluminium, often utilising the alternative photographic technique of the cyanotype.
In his work, Husak is attempting to bring order into a world that feels chaotic; beauty where there is ugliness. Taking the humble material of aluminium, he transforms it into something which sparkles akin to stardust. Blasting through the outer layers of the metal, he reveals the reflective inner - heightening what was utilitarian and creating a sensation of something which is greater than oneself. Husak is scratching at the divine in order that we are able to transcend ourselves, creating a moment of wonder.
Within his figurative series, we see the influence of the timeless tradition of the nude meeting elements of pop culture from the 1950s and 1960s. Having long been seduced by the beauty and perfection of the Classical world, Husak presents us with a very modern muse: the lithe and youthful man - channelling the look and movement of a fashion model in a neo-romantic way. In the image, we see the glitch - this is the double exposure, the jolt and the jut; a digital imperfection, a stuttering. The translucent edge of one body blurs and melds into the next. Here lies the space created for the viewer’s imagination - it elicits movement, it references the trace. Husak constructs his abstract series of works through taking elements from nature and fragmenting and rearranging them, until they become something verging on the sublime which may almost threaten to overwhelm the viewer. These are already phenomena - skies and clouds - so once complete, they transform into studies purely of tone and shadow.
