DUSA JESIH
Born 1977, Ljubljana, Slovenia
Dusa Jesih in the gallery.
Image courtesy of Galleri Weinberger Schandorff.
Dusa Jesih is a Slovenian artist renowned for her work in minimalism, geometric abstraction, and hard-edge painting. Her education in art and design spans all levels, including studies at the Academy of Fine Arts and Design in Ljubljana and the Cité Internationale des Arts in Paris, complemented by artist residencies in New York. Jesih has exhibited widely in solo and group shows across Slovenia and internationally, earning prestigious accolades, including the 2015 Prešeren Award, Slovenia’s highest national academic honor.
Jesih’s artistic approach is rooted in the language of abstract art, where she meticulously explores the relationships between shape, form, and color. Her works, often employing shaped canvases and polyptychs, defy the traditional flatness of painting by introducing dynamic compositions that emphasize spatial tension. Through her geometric and minimalist aesthetic, Jesih investigates how simple forms can elicit complex emotional responses. Her use of hard-edge techniques and precise, delineated forms creates stark contrasts between positive and negative space, emphasizing a play of light, surface, and structure.
In her polyptych works, Jesih arranges individual panels to create a larger, cohesive whole, challenging the boundaries of a single artwork. These multi-part compositions offer viewers a shifting perspective, encouraging them to engage with the rhythmic interplay of geometry and gesture. Despite the controlled formalism of her compositions, her works retain an emotive, lyrical quality, often incorporating gestural strokes and vibrant color fields that disrupt the rigidity of geometric precision.
Jesih's ability to synthesize the abstract with the gestural is particularly evident in her smaller "Pocket Edition" works, where she combines drawing, painting, and collage in a series of intimate, emotionally charged compositions. These miniature works are imbued with dynamic energy, balancing figuration with abstraction. The gestures, colors, and rhythmic patterns of her work often evoke the spontaneity of abstract expressionism, yet are tempered by the structural clarity of minimalist and geometric art traditions.
Her interest in the deformation of shape, the interplay between color and line, and the rhythmic repetition of geometric motifs reflects a deep engagement with the legacy of abstract art, while also marking her unique contribution to it. Jesih's paintings, whether monumental or miniature, operate as visual metaphors, inviting viewers to step into an imagined space that transcends reality.
Artist Statement
"The presentation of a painter, whose works hold a critical view of the social, cultural and political spheres of our existence, but in a little less conventional (fashionable) way for the present times. The goal of my art is to provide a critical overview of our social, cultural and political spheres in a slightly unconventional (trendy) manner. I am more interested in self-reflection on the phenomenon of alienation I am witnessing as it goes (contradictorily) hand in hand with globalization rather than focused on any political engagement. I feel like sheer existence is draining our last bits of energy in these crazy times.
We are straining ourselves with precarious work, fighting for our dear life and in the process forgetting about ourselves and our interpersonal relations. To live in unity and harmony, peace and love now seems an outdated and illusionary hippie idea that is so far from reality. I am trying to face this experience and internalise through the leitmotif of my last cycle of paintings called Unity. Using "as little words as possible" in minimalist "gestalt" language that allows for some artistic expression and space for the world of each individual, I am trying to transform unity into a hybrid of a warning (traffic) sign and icon "logo(therapeutic) type".
Although I follow the principle of "spot, line, surface in space" and focus on the basic elements of fine art, I tend to use colour, shape and composition to explore tensions in relationships between colours on the canvas as well as optical effects of more or less discernible forms.
My goal is to bring to the fore the foundations of meanings, emotions or narratives. My paintings feature similar visual signs that form new conceptual units in space, i.e. Gesamtkunstwerk, that open up new perspectives and encourage dialogue. My view of the final part revolves around a (harmonious) attitude towards space, possibly a very clear and brutal concrete area in all the seriousness of 'beauty in silence'". Dusa Jesih.
For more info, please visit Dusa Jesih in cyberspace
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