Marina Alvitr
Ivan Plusch’s project “Nine Circles of Life” refers to Dante’s “Divine Comedy”. It is dedicated not to life after death, but to what we experience during our lifetime. Now and then, the carpet strip twists, rises and falls, bends, comes from nowhere and ends nowhere, like our existence in this world. This symbol has various interpretations: as the life of an individual (especially of an artist like Marino Marini), or as the historical path of all Mankind, or as Art history in which Contemporary Art is bound with the experience of previous generations. Or even as something from a parallel universe: it suddenly appears in the museum and alters our perception of both its architecture and the works of Marino Marini.
One of the symbols that Ivan Plusch repeatedly employs – is red balls. On the one hand, it is important for the artist as a symbol of childhood that is decisive for our further life; on the other hand, it is a symbol of our genetic code which is, as it were, scattered throughout the museum and might be reassembled into a whole.
Along the path of the red carpet, we come across three of Plusch’s pictures, painted in dialogue with Marino Marini. The works duplicate Marini’s paintings, but are in Ivan Plusch’s style. It is a direct dialogue with the artist, demonstrating the connection between artists, upheld within the course of the constant transformations and development of Art. The works are painted in Plusch’s traditional manner and reflect the main theme that he addresses as an artist – the impossibility of living forever. His installation, made out of a red carpet strip, is also devoted to the process of departure, disappearance.
