Just as Kandinsky’s abstract compositions sought to translate the audible to the material, Alina’s soundscape at what is and what is not at Mandy Zhang Art transformed the gallery into a living, breathing canvas entering a dialogue beyond the traditional boundaries of the senses. writes Arina Baburskova
Sometimes it gets very quiet there The boundless void is gently filling the space This empty space slows down the time And then becomes a place of possibility
reads a brief verse on the last remaining handout - a piece of wax paper - serendipitously left for those who arrive to the openings late (me, as per usual). This small token from the exhibition alludes to a black-on-black canvas painting, enigmatically titled the void [you are everything and nothing at the same time].
The piece becomes activated by the viewer's movement under the directorial lights, and, upon closer examination, the subtle, barely perceptible geometric form of a medium-sized circle emerges near the upper right corner of the frameless canvas. This pitch-black composition of acrylic, charcoal, and ink reminiscent of Malevich’s and Reinhardt's iconic black squares is the work of London-based multidisciplinary artist with a Central Asian background Alina R.J., which serves as the inception point for her duet exhibition with Chinese-british artist Kelly Wu: what is and what is not.
Photography courtesy of artist
The Mandy Zhang Art show is the result of a four-week residency. As poetically expressed in the coinciding press release, the exhibition ‘delves into the spaces where spirituality meets the physical, the abstract encounters the tangible, and where the eternal is mirrored in the ephemeral’. The desire to simultaneously navigate and balance between these dualities is evident in the curatorial approach: artworks are intuitively dispersed across the walls, the floors, the free-standing plinths and small shelves set at different heights. The huge variety of shape, size, texture, and mediums transforms the marylbone space into a twenty-first- century wunderkammer of materiality.
Photography courtesy of artist
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'When religion, science, and morality are shaken (the latter by the forceful hand of Nietzsche) and external foundations begin to crumble,’ writes Kandinsky in the opening chapter of Concerning the Spiritual in Art, ‘a person turns their gaze inward. Literature, music and art are the first, most receptive areas where this turn to the Spiritual becomes apparent’. Reflecting this sentiment and drawing her inspiration that includes Kandinsky himself, the Kazakh-born artist incorporates all three formats within her practice.
In a recent interview during her residency studio visit, the artist revealed that the majority of her initial concepts and ideas emerge from visions encountered during meditation or in the liminal moments just before sleep. ‘I often struggle with falling asleep,' she shares, 'and during the time it takes me to drift off, I experience some of the most unique and vivid images. Fleeting shapes, colours and sounds, as well as more complex scenes ranging from abstract patterns to recognisable objects’.
The visions she witnesses during this transient state do not always materialise as paintings, sculptures, or in fact physical form at all. A much more elusive, yet undeniably significant, piece that exemplifies this is the captivating sound art composition can you keep a secret? (2023) spanning 2 minutes and 25 seconds on a continuous loop. Commencing with sparse and isolated sounds, the work with a question for the title gradually unfolds into a rich, multi-layered auditory narrative, evolving into something akin to a swarm of both natural and human-made noises; overlapping and intertwining until they fill the entirety of the room.
Originally created from an array of field recordings merged within Alina’s own poetry - elements that provided the aural backdrop to her 2024 eponymous short film - this enveloping soundscape becomes recontextualised within its new environment. Taking central stage, the projection's auditory architecture creates an interplayed dynamic between sound and space resonating with Kandinsky’s theoretical writings on synesthesia. Just as Kandinsky’s abstract compositions sought to translate the audible to the material, Alina’s soundscape transformed the gallery into a living, breathing canvas entering a dialogue beyond the traditional boundaries of the senses.
As a not-so-subtle homage to this theme of cyclicity and the profound symbolism of the circle - echoing throughout the exhibition in different forms, from painted surfaces to sculptural glass spheres and, finally, to a soundscape loop - let’s ‘come full circle’ and return to where we began: the black canvas. On it, this simplistically powerful shape, long associated with unity, infinity, and the cyclical nature of existence, is deliberately reduced to an almost monochromatic field, challenging the viewer's perception and evoking the concept of the Void. As expressed by Satre in Being and Nothingness, the Void is ultimately what allows for self-awareness and the freedom of choice, representing a total absence of predetermined essence or inherited meaning in the world, offering individuals the opportunity to create their own values and purposes. In Alina’s almost imperceptible circle, reduced to a minimalist geometric shape within a vast expanse of black, engages the viewer’s imagination and emotions, reflecting the sublime experience of confronting the infinite and unknowable aspects of existence.
Zen Buddhism, on the other hand, interprets the Void (Śūnyatā) as a concept grounded in an understanding of emptiness and the nature of reality - where the Void is perceived not as a lack but as a fertile ground of potential, an acknowledgment that all things are transient. But perhaps the most evident influence for the artist’s most recent body of work is Fritjof Capra’s book The Tao of Physics, 1975, which explores the parallel between Eastern Philosophies and modern physics, suggesting that the concept of emptiness on these traditions can be seen as a dynamic place from which all form and phenomena originate. Clearly drawing from Capra, Alina’s inclusion of this interpretation in the very title of the piece (you are everything and nothing at the same time) invites her viewers to ‘turn their gaze inward’ and contemplate emptiness as a space of boundless possibilities, to find an infinite creative potential within.
Arina Baburskova is a London-based writer and art journalist, with a focus on contemporary art and fashion
