Andrej Dúbravský – THE REST INTERVAL 6. 5. – 21. 6.

THE REST INTERVAL

curator: Jan Christoph Breitwieser

In “Rest Interval,” Dúbravský develops a visual world that can be described as a form of “biological expressionism.” The exhibition features numerous paintings of bees, chickens, and other organisms that do not appear as distinct groups of motifs but, together with the human figures, form a coherent whole. The result is a world of the living, in which all bodies—human and non-human alike—are interconnected through pulse, movement, and constant change.

Nature and the body do not stand side by side or in parallel here, but are expressions of the same system: a vibrating, breathing structure in which energy, growth, and transformation are continuously taking place.

The human figures depicted are in states of transition: they are falling, collapsing, or on the verge of doing so. These moments are deliberately left ambiguous—the bodies appear at once strong and exhausted, resilient and vulnerable, both victim and hero. Falling can be understood both as a loss of control and as an act of letting go: as an opportunity to escape pressure and return to a state of lightness and bodily self-awareness.

Dúbravský thus shifts the focus from rational, overburdened thinking to the immediate experience of the body—both one’s own and that of nature. Central to this is also the painterly interest in the surface of the skin, in its texture, permeability, and vitality as a site where internal and external states are inscribed.

His visual language also engages in a deliberate dialogue with art history: the dynamic, animated bodies evoke Peter Paul Rubens, while the expressive fragility and physical intensity draw parallels to Egon Schiele and Francis Bacon. These influences are not merely cited, however, but are transformed into a contemporary, independent style of painting.

Rest Interval as a Sociopolitical Metaphor

Beyond the individual body, “Rest Interval” becomes a reflection on the state of the present. In a time of global and local tension, the exhibition advocates for the possibility of pausing, stepping back, and reducing constant evaluation and criticism.

It proposes understanding rest not as a retreat, but as an active practice: as a moment in which tolerance, perception, and a conscious engagement with oneself and others become possible once again.

As part of the exhibition you can see a short movie The Good From Slovakia directed by Michael Bukovanský and produced by the Telegraph Gallery and shor documentary movie about preparation of the exhibition The rest Interval by Lucie Klímová