IULIA NISTOR

Like the display of a study, painting and writing are placed side by side. New works from Iulia Nistor’s ongoing series of Evidence-paintings are presented next to related text-works. In the paintings, she aims to depict the contingent properties of objects, which leads to the exclusion of the image of the object itself. This empirical process does not result in a common aesthetic, as it is intended to capture the phenomenon in question. “Paint has been applied to wooden supports with a precision and formal variety that implies accuracy to ulterior subjects, which yet remain undefinable,” Mark Prince describes in his text for the show, also suggesting that “It is consistent with this cultivation of paradox that, although Nistor’s paintings are riddled with illusionism, they question its workings rather than attempting to conceal them.” Painting does not serve to communicate contents, but is rather used by the artist as an opportunity to observe the mental processes inherent to the act of representation.

The text-works are working sheets on which Nistor formulates propositions that describe and question the concepts related to this process. A typed version of several sentences written underneath each other is commented on and corrected by hand, which gives insight into her process of thinking and doubt. Furthermore, it suggests a sedimentation through revision and redefinition, paralleled in the paintings. Both painting and writing are presented as processes that formulate and challenge how we think and perceive.

Extending this inquiry into the physical space, Nistor’s interventions mimic architectural or structural elements that are typically taken for granted. These additions seamlessly blend with their surroundings and are not mentioned on the exhibition’s floor plan or the list of works, thus concealing their artistic origin and exposing our assumptions about what is given and what is made. By inducing uncertainty and doubt, these spatial manipulations further expose how our perception is informed by our concepts and expectations.

Iulia Nistor(1985, Bucharest) is a visual artist and philosopher, living and working in Berlin and São Paulo. Nistor graduated in philosophy and completed her doctorate at the University of Regensburg. She received a Meisterschüler in Fine Arts from Städelschule in Frankfurt am Main. She will participate in the 2024/25 Whitney Museum Independent Study Program (ISP).