Compositions are simple and unpretentious, sometimes deliberately fragmentary but always aristocratic and refined, for true aesthetes. The works give rise to a sensation of serenity and tranquillity, while Ilona uses a special manner of painting — free and dynamic. Her canvases bear broad and expressive strokes, combined with delicate lines, and the composition is decorative, built up via layers of tonal colour. Monochrome colour harmony, a general architectonics of works, and sensual female perception of the world create laconic artistic images of the pictures, which are often filled with symbolism. It also includes the artist’s aspirations to ‘see the world in a grain of sand’. Such concept of the Belarusian artist is, in many respects, consonant with traditional Japanese painting, which perceives nature as faultless and divine.
Ms. Kosobuko reinterprets the principles of traditional Japanese landscape painting, adding deep lyricism and her own individuality to the Eastern flavour — as seen in her use of hanging and horizontal ‘manuscript’ formats, as if unrolling in the process of examination.
The artist chose the title Dance of the Wind to unite her works, created at various times and with independent content. Since ancient times, dance has possessed symbolic meaning and deep sacral sense. Meanwhile, the wind played an important role in Japanese mythology. This natural element symbolised the dragon which had been exerted an influence on weather, wind and rain. The invention of the special dance was necessary to blandish this ‘deity’. It is possible that Ms. Kosobuko (being harmonious and creative by nature) seeks balance on a subconscious level.
Ilona’s picturesque expressiveness builds a dance balancing the forces of nature and establishing harmony in the world. We almost feel the light breath of the wind passing from one canvas to another, swaying the Minsk treetops and the elegant reeds on the marshes, tickling flower petals and moving through the small, provincial streets of France. The artist’s artworks invite spectators to experience these moments of life and to enjoy them while plunging into the world of harmony and beauty.
Ilona Kosobuko likes to exhibit her works, having taken part in the Vera project at Lisbon’s Maritime Museum last year, and the Art-Zurich event, as well as the 4th Biennale Exhibition of Painting, Sculpture and Graphic Arts Formazmest-703 in Minsk.
Meanwhile, her works feature at the National Art Museum of Belarus and the Modern Fine Arts Museum in Minsk, at the Art Museum of Bulgarian Varna, and the United Arab Emirates’ Art Museum of Sharjah, and in collections held by Deutsche Bank and Liebherr Concern, in Germany, as well as in private collections.
By Victor Mikhailov
