Vav 1987

Erol Akyavaş made this painting, Vav, with big, open gestures, in a colour palette that’s like a deep night sky. I can imagine him making it, layering thin washes of paint, letting it drip, then maybe going back in with a dry brush, pulling the paint across the surface. There's a kind of tension between the fluid forms and that solid square of gold. I wonder if he was thinking about geometry versus nature? The painting feels like a meditation on opposites: fixed versus fluid, earthly versus celestial. Akyavaş is playing with depth, and the painting feels very spacious, like it’s opening up onto another world. It reminds me a little of Mark Rothko’s colour field paintings, that same sense of atmosphere and spirituality. And then I see connections to Cy Twombly’s playful mark-making and poetic scribbles. Artists are always having these silent conversations, riffing off each other, inspiring each other to see things in new ways.