Melody 1988

Oleg Holosiy made "Melody", which is 80 by 100 cm and painted with oil. This painting doesn't give you everything all at once. It's dark, but there are white and yellow marks breaking through. It’s got a hesitant, searching kind of quality, which is also what makes it feel so alive. The surface of this painting is really interesting. It feels built up and rough in places, like he was really pushing the paint around. And then other areas are super thin, almost transparent. You can see how the materiality itself becomes this emotional language. Look at that little cluster of marks in the upper center—they almost glow against the darkness. I keep thinking about the gesture of making them. Holosiy died young, but it makes me think of another artist, maybe someone like Kiefer, who also wrestled with darkness and history on a big scale. It's like this conversation across time, where artists are picking up on each other's frequencies, trying to make sense of things that are hard to put into words.