In the presence of the lake Painting

Aleksandr Biruk is a Belarusian artist living and working in Tbilisi. He likens his creative process to that of a composer. He creates visual music, transferring the emotional state of his images to his audience through the interplay of form, colour and silhouettes. His process brings him great joy, and this joy can be felt when viewing his images. When asked about what’s so joyful about his process, Biruk said that the emotions he pours into his work allow him to fight death. ‘It is not about immortality, rather, it’s about filling people with life. What we perceive as reality is in fact superficial. A tree, for example, isn’t simply a tree; it’s a phenomenon, a thing of existence. There is a mystical connection to nature.’ At the same time, however, it is important to convey things simply, to boil things down to their essence. ‘Imagine a sculptor who makes a red box and calls it ‘red box,’’ he says. ‘I think that’s really cool. In life there are very few things that are as real as that.’