It’s the big finale of an epic Samurai saga and the main protagonist is reappearing from the thick
fog which is shrouding an obscured landscape. The quietness is interrupted with suggestive koto
sounds and the almost perceptible rhythm of the fearless warrior's panting. As if the whole
universe had stopped to recoup, the only movements are the synchronized dance of the branches
and the weaving of his kimono. The tensed stillness is unflinchingly building up to the climax with
an unnerving countdown of the piercing light flashing from the edge of his razor-sharp katana...
This, in a nutshell, is the atmosphere permeating Nik Christensen's (Bromley, 1973) new body of
work comprising Light in the Fog, an exhibition that will inaugurate the new chapter for
Amsterdam's platform The Curators Room - La Oficina Barcelona. The 10 monochromatic
paintings included in the presentation were produced in a period of a year and a half, and are
marking a big switch to canvas after years of drawing with inks on paper. Approaching the "new"
medium with the same interest and methodology, the Amsterdam-based artist is exclusively using
black acrylic and inks to construct exciting and highly dynamic visuals. Confidently relying on the
familiarity with tools, materials, and the dynamics of the process, adding paint and going darker
emerges as the only way to rectify. Such a one-way route turns the untouched white surface into
the artist’s entry point to the work as well as a getaway out of it. Emphasizing the universal
symbolics of the light and making it that much more precious and fundamental, the technique is
underlining the tension that can at any point tip over.
Fascinated by the power of a few bold gestures on a picture plane, often employed by the
traditional Japanese landscape painters or calligraphers, Christensen's process is founded on the
balance between having control and having no control at all. In that regard he is using specific
materials and preparation methods that require him to work with quick and intuitive mark-making,
overtaking the paint or ink's disobedient behavior along the way. Building his imagery with small,
impulsive outbursts instead of having lengthy, tedious routines, he sets off on a never-ending
quest of exploring the new, unbeaten paths. Resonating with the unforeseen ways the elements
are communicating or the materials are interacting, and his emotional states or external
influences, the work is unquestionably "in the now", a coded document of the given moment or a
period. By consenting to the image's development beyond his intention, there is a great amount of
fearlessness in the mark-making and the looseness in the brush, scale, boldness, or any given
element that couldn’t be calculated or preplanned. In the end, the limitations of such an approach
don’t allow much room for mistakes or correction so the intuitiveness and immediacy, as well as
confidence and determination, becomes crucial to the work. Disregarding the fear of "messing
things up", the work carries the scars of the process as its distinctive features, accepting it in its
entirety.
With Light in the Fog, Christensen is directing his own ensemble of fantastical theater performers
as deconstructed figure-based abstractions reminiscent of dignitary official portraits, inspired by
Kurosawa's movies, Ukiyo prints, as well as traditional Japanese theatre, Kabuki, or Butoh dance.
Treating the sitters as collections of features from which he is sculpting new models on a flat
surface, they are used as an amalgamation of props he is continuously breaking apart and putting
back together. The altered forms are then placed closer to the viewer and in full-frontal, pushing
the details of the fabric patterns, the stance, and the fiery shapes to a more prominent position
against the vague surroundings. Their theatrical, static postures are suggesting movement that
preceded or is following, placing them in an “in-between” moment and accentuating the underlying