AUTHOR Elías López
PUBLISHED 04. FEB 2025
Researching on the topic of the meaning and materiality of presence and absence, we’re hosting the multinidsciplinary artist Eliška Kováčiková who drives a dialogue between different mediums such as drawing and sculpting, installation and animation. Get to meet Eliška Kováčiková´s work through the following questions provided by Young Curator Elías López.
// How would you describe the connection between your sculptural work and the virtual development of underground spaces?
In my artistic practice, rather than focusing solely on observable spaces—their scales and volumes—I aim to highlight the in-between spaces: those between buildings, bodies, and structures. This approach applies to my sculptural work as well as to other media I work with, including drawing, printmaking, sound, and, in this particular case, 3D virtual space. I see these in-between volumes as meeting points of diverse unseen forces, making them fascinating parts of the urban landscape. Applying this same principle to the 3D video work featured at LICHTROUTEN 2025 was a natural step.
// Considering that the LICHTROUTEN theme is “new energies,” how does your project connect to this main focus?
My artistic practice is centered on diverse unseen forces, which I perceive as the energy of the city—a ghostly pulsation lingering in a place, waiting to be witnessed. Rather than “new” energies, I am interested in already existing but hidden energies that can be discovered, seen, or sensed. I see this process of rediscovering these energies as a crucial connection between humans and the environments they inhabit.
// How does the process of working with virtual particles reveal the hidden forces that inhabit the environments you explore?
‘Threshold of Silence’ is an experimental work that seeks to highlight these unseen forces through the interplay of positive and negative space. The relationship between space and the observer—particularly the observer’s position (in this case, the movement of the camera)—is a crucial factor in experiencing the piece. The work is driven by a sense of dynamism: creation and destruction, disappearance and appearance, transformation. These ideas inspire the project both formally and conceptually. A key element of the artwork is time. By using photogrammetry to capture existing inhabited urban sites, the imperfections of the technology render them abandoned and aged. In contrast, abstract volumes sculpted from the same scans introduce a more fluid and variable perception of time.
// Why is it important to discuss new energies both as resources and as spiritual matters?
The world we live in is shaped by rapid technological advancements, globalization, increasing interconnectedness, as well as the accelerating climate crisis, human overpopulation, and the persistent threat of war—both locally and globally. These realities urge us to rethink fundamental questions of space and spatiality: What defines living space today? What will it be in the future? Or, more importantly, what should it be?
The meaning of freedom is increasingly fluid, while the notions of limitation and restriction become more prominent. Spaces evoke emotions, and even the most intricate relationships between bodies and spaces can be understood through them. I see the rediscovery of spatial energies as a source of new hope for the future, making it an essential focus for future discourse.