RELIC

Clay, porcelain, oxides, underglaze, glazes, 13x9x22in (33х23х55cm), 2026

The work “Relic” resembles a reliquary and refers to the tradition of preserving

what is valuable and sacred (most often fragmented, preserved parts of saints’

bodies. This tradition has always evoked mixed feelings in me, as if horror were

being hidden beneath aesthetics).

I decided to preserve my own fears.

The base of the object is heavy, stable, almost architectural. It is covered with

ornamentation that refers to European Baroque, but stripped of its decorative

function: it is worn away, damaged, and has lost its solemnity.

This is not Baroque as a style, but Baroque as a memory of a style. This is not

ornament - it is a symptom.

The blue color is not festive but faded, like fabric that was once ceremonial. There

is no nostalgia here - only the trace of time.

The upper part is no less essential. The curls on top are no longer ornament but

movement, spasm, gesture. The form twists in on itself, trying to hold together, to

endure.

This is not decoration but tension.

The interior is the unexpected part of the work.

Inside there is neither emptiness nor a “secret,” no specific object, but a dense

mass of dark, formless matter — unshaped fear, before words, before images.