Way Too Personal Constructions

Metal and recycled materials used by Lubo Mikle in his art may strike us as cold and impersonal. Yet metal is just its external sign, an identifier, just like his predilection for abbreviations in the titles. These apparent shortcuts are in fact a subtle way of getting us to care, through the works, more about the artist himself. Or vice versa

B. 1 S. conceals a plain fact – the address of his studio in Koliba (Brečtanová 1) he had to leave. Leaving a familiar and intimate place that offered him a protection from the outside world, the place that was his inspiration and catalyst for his work. Motion is both a loss and an opportunity for new experiences. B. 1 S. could easily be not a mere a title of the exhibition, but also the journey Mikle has taken over the ten years.

His previous exhibition B.E.H. at White & Weiss Gallery in 2019, addressed the theme of vanishing airplanes and their remnants. It was already then that we were able to sense somewhat of an obsession with motion. Mikle spends part of the year in Australia. This perpetual movement weaves immanently through his oeuvre.

Recycling is an important feature in his work. Mikle reincarnates materials.  He shifts the meaning of their original use not only on an aesthetic level, but mainly on a personal, intimate one. As if every single object he works with held an important place in his biography, leaving it as a mysterious enigma for the perceptive viewer. Each sculpture thus becomes a material side-effect of the inner world. His sculptures often express the contrast between the industrial solidity of the material and the delicate poetics of the form.

S.E. (Subsonic Exoskeleton – Soul Eater) is a prime example of Mikle’s ability to create a tension between the dynamism of sculpture and the static nature of recycled materials. Constructed from scaffolding joints designed to ensure static fixation, the sculpture captures movement while ingeniously camouflaging the idea. The scaffolding thus serves as a kind of personal construction that Mikle uses to reinforce his art.  We cannot build a house without scaffolding. Without joints – relationships – a house lacks stability. This is also Mikle, the unconventional map of his personality is concealed beneath the cold metal construction. Think of the objects made from car wrecks, which served as a visual act of his grappling with a serious car accident.

The sculpture S. of D. (Simulation of Departure) is made of metal profiles from the shelves of his studio in Brečtanová Street, where he had long lived and worked. He breathed new life into the metal elements. They represent his coming to terms with departure and a new beginning. In the pure conservation of movement, the artist reveals intimately his dependence on a particular place and how the loss creates a sense of uncertainty and doubt, but also of a new beginning. Even a journey can be an ordeal. It is good that Mikle does not confuse movement with activity.

In the sculpture series D.I.O.T.R. (Dead Plastic on the Road), he explores the time-collecting packages in which a human being is condensed with his personal stories. Each of the pressure cookers was once used in a household and, through the scrap yards, has suddenly become an artefact that preserves different stories. We are free to make assumptions about them, if we so wish. It is perhaps unnecessary to emphasise the relationship between movement and time. One does not exist without the other. Yet it is precisely the preservation of time that leads us in an arc to a sense of transience and loss. Of everything. Even humanity, which we perceive through sculpture.

H.T. (Human Trafficking) is about another movement – that of migrants towards a better future. We know, however, that it also brings death and, upon arrival in the desired paradise, hell. An accusation against smugglers and politicians who profit from the movement of the most vulnerable. Mikle shows himself as a filmmaker who is also concerned with issues of social inequality, discrimination and war.

The sculpture of Pussy differs from Mikle’s work only in appearance. It represents a dead, dried-up cat that has been left lying behind a cupboard for years. Mikle has transformed it into a kind of mummy, a deity that warns us with a raised finger that we are not here forever. The transience, the insignificance of the living in the face of eternity. Mikle is an artist with a rich inner world and a well-developed imagination.

At the same time, Mikle is also an active and acclaimed artist who reaches audiences on different continents. In 2023, he was awarded the prestigious NordArt Prize for his impressive oversized work KUVYT. NordArt, one of the largest contemporary art exhibitions in Europe, is held annually in Büdelsdorf, Germany. His winning work was made during the pandemic as an urgent need to provide a different take on a world gripped by fear. His large-scale sculptures and projects are also appreciated in Australia, where he is regularly featured at major art events such as Sculpture by the Sea and the Snowy Valleys Sculpture Trail. Sculpture by the Sea at Bondi Beach is one of the largest outdoor sculpture exhibitions in the world.

Pavol Weiss

Lubo Mikle was born in Bratislava in 1982. In 2000 – 2006 he studied under Juraj Meliš at the Department of Sculpture, Object, Installation at the Academy of Fine Arts in Bratislava. He works principally with sculpture, sound object and installation. His work combines elements of recycling with industrial themes, destruction with transformation and construction; his sculptures are often monumental in scale. He lives and works in Bratislava and Sydney.

White & Weiss Gallery programme in 2024 was supported from the public funds by the Slovak Art Council.