Croatian artist Mia Stark practices a cross-disciplinary approach to printmaking in order to express her firm belief in the movement of our body as an identifier of our personality and even our identity. In lithography, the most direct printmaking technique that allows for easy, free mark-making with no resistance of the material matrix, Mia explores and pushes the boundaries between dance and visual arts.
“As an amateur contemporary dancer I like to combine the art of dance and printmaking. I am interested in integrating multiple media in one work, with the intention to discover and further explore the commonalities between the body movement in dance and visual arts. Moving is the basic and essential human characteristic. Our movements are specific and defined by our personality, our identity, which is even more pronounced by dance and results in a moment of our absolute liberation. The inspiration I draw from dance and the movement guides the visual forms and compositions translated into my prints.
In the presented monochromatic prints, I used toner to create dynamic compositions. With my hands, palms and fingerprints, I touched the lithography stone, directly, in a movement that liberated me as it does when I dance. No tools were used, no brushes, no crayons. It is about the process itself, the dynamics and energy of the body movement, rather than a specific message or narrative; leaving it to the viewers to interpret the forms found within the process of making. While preparing the stone, I connect my body, the ink and the stone in the sense that one extends the other, adding physicality to the final prints.”
All images: Mia Stark, lithographs on paper from the series Untitled. Photographs by Mia Stark.
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