SHADOW OF ANOTHER
NOAH SPIVAK
30 MARCH – 13 APRIL 2024
GALLERY 2
VIEW CATALOGUE
Exhibition Statement
Shadow of Another presents a series of fragile landscapes that reflect and disillusion their surroundings. With this new body of work, Spivak provides the audience with a moment for introspection to consider ourselves in all of our complexities and gain an understanding for the realities we construct. For the artist, the silvered surfaces suggest the powerful duality of narcissism over his own identity – the created and perceived self – existing together in one space but impossibly so. Spivak uses this opportunity to publicly gesture towards his own issues in confidence, delusion and their respective relationships to self/image.
Spivak has spent the last five years exploring the alchemical reactions of the 18th century, specifically silver’s relationship with glass. Shadow of Another marks an integral pivot in Spivak’s artistic process, one that the artist has been pining over since he began learning of this wondrous, and versatile, medium. Taking inspiration from the intersections of stained glass windows, Spivak uses both textured and smooth surfaces to achieve a myriad of reflection. At first glance the overlapping motifs appear confused, as if they are fighting for attention, but slowly the harmony of each opposing plane comes together to create a single, unified artwork. As the piece reveals itself, the viewer and artist alike are reminded that the perceptions cast on ourselves change the more time we spend with them. Simply put, Shadow of Another is an investigation of the liminal space
between narcissism and self-loathing – while simultaneously reminding each of us of our own delicate relationship with confidence and criticism.
This exhibition has been supported by the City of Melbourne Arts Grants.
Artist Biography
Noah Spivak studied at the Cooper Union School of Art, New York and received a Bachelor of Fine Art in photography from Emily Carr University of Art and Design, Vancouver (2015). He soon after migrated to Melbourne where he has been an active exhibitor both nationally and internationally. The artist’s compulsive urge to collect – objects, relationships, meaning – is used to navigate the small phenomena of the reality we inhabit; pulling inspiration not from what our senses have access to, but rather, their limitations and inaccuracies. Creating mixed media installations, Spivak often employs a level of ephemerality into his work as a tool to help remind himself, and by extensions his viewers, that we are in fact a fleeting (and not a forever) moment. Spivak’s current processes collaborate with the alchemical world, creating temporal artworks that express a deep adoration and understanding for the materials used. His fascination with the invisible and obsession for process-led experimentation culminate in a body of work that explores how we experience visual art and the subconscious decisions we make leading up to this moment.