This March, WOAW Gallery presents Truth Be Told, a duo show featuring 13 recent works by Larissa De Jesús Negrón and Kristína Bukovčáková in the gallery’s Singapore space. Although permeated with a sense of unreality through fantastical dreamscapes, strange creatures, or distorted figures, their distinctive visuals are held together by sincerity and literalism. Often overlapping aesthetically and technically, the works discuss disparate yet existential subjects and are driven by honest introspection and contemplation. So, Truth Be Told, they are setting the stage for a harmonious dialogue between artists’ practices while providing honest insight into their psyche.

Imbuing the new series of paintings with nostalgia, anticipatory fear, and homesickness, the Puerto Rican, New York-based artist is giving shape to her feelings about the uncertainty of the future. Similarly, the Slovakian artist also truthfully speaks of similar concerns but looks at the grander scale, the environmental crisis, and humanity’s destructive position. So, where De Jesús Negrón hopes to process the fear of change with these works, Bukovčáková expresses deep and unflickering concern for the future of permaculture, biodiversity, and anthropocentric ecosystems. They both evoke the peculiar Surrealism ambiance by employing something that can be described as “Internet aesthetic,” a visual language that blends real-world elements with digital-like enhancements. This ambiance extends to the unconventional color schemes that contribute to the overall sense of unreality, bizarre or fantastical scenes that construct unexpected and thought-provoking associations, or visual metaphors that convey deeper meanings.

“I paint myself because I am so often alone and because I am the subject I know best,” Frida Kahlo infamously stated about her practice. Decades later, Larissa De Jesús Negrón is also looking inward for a source of inspiration. But where her previous work delved into everyday situations and experiences, these paintings have a strong focus on her relationship with her roots. In order to look deep and find answers to burning questions, De Jesús Negrón is literally going beneath the surface to understand the truth of what I’m going through (The Watcher Knows Best, 2024). The urge to keep exploring and experimenting with materials and styles permeates the entire body of work, occasionally including the literal, textual elements in the work What the Future Holds Keeps Me Up at Night, 2024.

Permeating the entire body of work, the overall “feeling blue” ambiance is underlined by the prominent use of blue, emphasising uncertainty and concern while evoking the Caribbean blue skies. Such an emotive setup is notable in Waiting to Come Back Home, 2024, where the naked figure is despairingly positioned in an empty room, surrounded by Dali-esque rock clocks. More Surrealist influences can be seen in Absorbing Culture and Ocean View, both 2024, where the disorienting sense of ambiguity or multiple meanings is constructed by manipulating the perspective and scale or layering different imagery. All of this conveys the confusion and concern that she is confronting with sincerity and respect.

But where De Jesús Negrón’s droplets symbolise heartache and pain, for Bukovčáková, they epitomize the critical stage of ongoing climate change. Sparse and evaporating in the sun, they symbolise the last source of nourishment that her floral protagonist might be getting (Fragile Day of this Summer, 2023). “I found I could say things with color and shapes that I couldn’t say any other way—things I had no words for,” Georgia O’Keeffe admitted about her visual vocabulary, and it seems that the Slovakian artist is utilising a similar quality of such an approach. Looking at the plants as an indicator of the fragile biodiversity that will not accommodate us forever, her practice employs technical and conceptual experimentation to convey the ambiance of sincere concern. Instead of depicting pure, untouched, beautiful nature, slightly dystopian scenes are developed also using the aforementioned “Internet aesthetic” (Bath, Weird Smell, both 2023).

Where such visual language initially reflects the dynamic and constantly evolving nature of online culture, here it helps convey the sense of deterioration toward an unpleasant future (Bleeding but Alive, 2023). For this, Bukovčáková also employs a Surrealist-like imaginative and unconventional approach to depicting reality and enhancing the sense of strangeness and doom. Attributing human qualities to the plants and insects and transforming the human’s presence into symbols of devastation, the works challenge viewers to question their perception and explore the depths of the subconscious mind.

Truth Be Told: a duo show by Larissa De Jesús Negrón and Kristína Bukovčáková runs from 15th March to 20th April 2024 at WOAW Gallery Singapore. More information available here