Tondo Red

Romanian-born Melbourne-based artist, Cristina Popovici, creates bold paintings and mixed media works with passion and vigour. Trained in the European tradition of fine art, Popovici has used this as the foundation on which to build a particularly compelling and unrestrained body of abstract expressionist work. Preferring to allow the energy and emotion to erupt unfettered onto the canvas, she describes her recent action paintings, such a Bloom, as the ‘brush’. “There is no narrative in my pieces, instead, each work embodies a specific emotion, presented in raw, and expressive gestures,” says Popovici. The artists current exhibition in Melbourne, entitled ‘Memory Maps’, depicts past experiences in a new light through dual entities – the presence and absence of colour through the use of silver leaf. Contrasting bright tones, marks coated in silver leaf create a moody atmosphere. Light is a key component that adds impact to the bi-dimensional gestures – the dimmer the tones and the less light present, the more life the mark embodies.