Joni Zakonjšek: Blaženo tvoja / Blissfully yours 
31. 3. – 26. 4. 2017
ACE KIBLA / KiBela, Ulica Kneza Koclja 9, Maribor

“All of the paintings have already been exhibited before, but will appear in Maribor arranged in a new constellation: seas, meadows, cosmic cores in their alluvium, a small composition of new circles-watercolors, and a large painting from the process that allows a peak under the skin of the painting. The latter, like all the others, features a powerful, very colorful space explosion, through which, like through a ritual, I enter into the  ainting. All the others are covered by the facet of a painting with a very lengthy meditative process, so that it can condense and sew up all this tapestry into a new kind of immensity, and the myriad of strokes into timelessness, while the background remains hidden, known only to the painting itself. This is the first time I want to exhibit the painting so naked, so stripped to the core, because the little paintings on rice paper, exposing a strange dance, the presence of dervishes, are sewn onto felt fabric; I see them on pillars, creating a space of some kind of ecstasy, bliss, which is known very well to all the paintings. But in terms of structure and color, these small-sized paintings are exactly the same as the paintings in their backgrounds…”
– Joni Zakonjšek during exhibition set-up

Nature in the painting, a painting in nature. A painter of nature, who is nature herself. She is one inside nature, like all of us are. We are together, naturally connected into oneness. We are one. Everything is one. The whole is a part. And one is everything. A part is a whole. Though empty, and to some imperfect, we are perfect with nature. We reside in nature and nature dwells in us. When somebody screams “it’s in my nature”, they disclose this (un)intentionally. It is only in the perception and acceptance of this that we can live. See, listen, smell, taste, feel each other not only like one another, but intuitively perceiving everything inside us, so that we weave a common fabric, which does not let anybody go. It captures and embraces the perceptible and the imperceptible. Occasionally one of the threads, thin like silk but flexible, will snap, it is ruptured, but silkworms will soon be there to heal it. Joni’s paintings are this kind of world, our world, which she paints and unveils on her canvases. It appears mysterious, but once we catch sight of it, it will inspire us, it will absorb us, just like nectar is absorbed by a butterfly to quench its thirst, and just like the waves of a tide embrace the rock to bathe it. Like windows to nature, they become doors that lead to us. Let’s try not just opening them, but also stepping through them. And we will be there and here, inside ourselves and with anyone, anytime, anywhere we wish to be. We will be together.
– Peter Tomaž Dobrila

Joni Zakonjšek was born on 22 September 1974 in Koper. After finishing gymnasium she spent two years in London, obtaining a degree from the Foundation Course of Art at the White Chapel Art School. In 1996 she began studying at the Academy of Fine Arts in Ljubljana, graduating in 2003 under Professors Emerik Bernard and Marko Uršič, and later completed her specialization studies under the mentorship of Gustav Gnamuš. From 2004 she acts as an independent visual artist, entering the Slovenian fine art scene with a solo exhibition at the Praetorian Palace in Koper in 2002. Since then, her works have been showcased in numerous solo exhibitions at established exhibition spaces, as well as in group exhibitions both home and abroad. Originally from the Primorska region of Slovenia, she lives and works in Bela Krajina, where she devotes herself entirely to painting. She has received several awards in recognition of her work.

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