4. “Golden Surrealism”: a personal visual language
If her visual proposal had to be summed up in a single label, the one she herself has promoted is “Golden Surrealism”. This phrase appears on roll-ups, wall texts, and promotional materials for her exhibitions at Las Arenas, the airport, and other venues, and it has become a recognizable mark of her work.
4.1. Gold as material and concept
Gold is not a mere decorative touch: it functions as a structural element of the image. In many pieces, large areas of the canvas are built using gold leaf or metallic pigments that:
- Capture and reflect light, changing according to the viewer’s position.
- Create tension between flat surface and illusory volume.
- Introduce a layer of secular sacredness: gold evokes Byzantine icons, religious altarpieces, and archaeological treasures, but here it is intertwined with contemporary scenes, everyday objects, and imaginary figures.
In series such as “Golden Tales”, exhibited in Valencia, this use of gold is explicitly linked to the idea of storytelling: these are paintings that invite the viewer to “imagine” and reconstruct, from fragments, a narrative that is never fully spelled out.
4.2. Narrative surrealism
Although her work draws from historical surrealism, Istorik’s approach is less automatic and more narrative. In pieces such as Resolution of Uncertainty, shown in Karlsruhe, we see everyday elements—a wardrobe, a mirror—combined with impossible figures—unfinished reflections, a zeppelin—that stage the idea of choice as an existential decision.
The artist herself explains that “choice is the resolution of uncertainty in human activity in the face of a plurality of alternatives,” and that in any practical problem there are several options, both by chance and by conscious decision.
What is interesting is that this philosophical reflection does not result in a theoretical essay, but in a spatio-temporal image:
- The wardrobe, mirror, and zeppelin function as symbols of identity, destiny, and journey.
- Incomplete reflections and unstable perspectives intensify the sense of indecision.
- Gold appears as a field of possibilities, as a space between concrete reality and the realm of imagination.
4.3. Movement, bodies, and architecture
In many large-format works—for example, the huge painting installed at Valencia Airport—the composition is organized through diagonal movements, figures in suspension, staircases, architectural fragments, and bodies that seem to drift through space as if immersed in a current of air or water.
Formally, this translates into:
- Lines of force that cross the canvas from corner to corner.
- Overlapping of intense color fields (reds, blues, golds) that suggest depth without abandoning the flatness of the surface.
- A constant dialogue between the figurative and the abstract: parts of the canvas dissolve into color patches, while others retain very defined details.
There is a clear obsession with movement: bodies going up and down stairs, figures flying or falling, objects appearing in transit. That dynamism resonates strongly with the spaces where the works are displayed (airports, hotels, fairs), places of passage where people are literally on the move.
4.4. Color and emotion
Color in Istorik’s work is not naturalistic; it follows an emotional grammar.
- Reds and oranges create areas of intensity, danger, desire, or transformation.
- Blues and turquoises evoke water, sky, and a more open mental space.
- Gold functions as an axis of unity, as a metaphor for the precious and unrepeatable nature of each instant.
This palette makes the works feel like theatrical or cinematic stages, where something is happening—or about to happen—and the viewer arrives right at the moment of maximum tension.
5. Live art: process as a shared spectacle
One of Aleksandra Istorik’s defining traits is her commitment to live art, a performative practice in which the act of painting becomes a public event. Local media emphasize this facet, noting that she is “known for initiatives such as ‘Arte en directo’ at the Hotel Balneario Las Arenas and at Valencia Airport, where she painted her canvases interacting with the public and making them part of her creative process.”
This approach has several consequences:
- Demystifying the studio
The studio ceases to be a closed, private space and becomes a stage. The public can see the first strokes, corrections, overlapping color layers, and sudden decisions. - Pedagogical dimension
Even without formal instruction, simply watching the artist work live has an educational effect: viewers gain a better understanding of the time, effort, and technique behind a finished painting. - Emotional participation
The work is no longer a static object; it is perceived as the result of a process that the audience has partially witnessed. That experience creates a different kind of bond with the piece. - Adaptation to the context
Painting live in a hotel or an airport requires adapting the rhythm and scale of the painterly gesture to the flow of people, the architecture, and the available light. The environment becomes part of the artwork.
In a certain sense, Istorik’s live art functions as a bridge between traditional easel painting and contemporary practices of performance and relational art, without ever giving up the centrality of the final image.
6. Reading some key works and series
6.1. “Resolution of Uncertainty”
This work, exhibited at Karlsruhe Art, is described as one of the artist’s “masterpieces.” It features a wardrobe, a mirror, incomplete reflections, and a zeppelin—ordinary and unusual elements mixed into a scene full of psychological tension.
The interpretation proposed by Istorik—the idea of choice as resolution of uncertainty—invites the viewer to read the painting as:
- An inner space (the wardrobe, the mirror) where possible identities are debated.
- An outer space (the zeppelin, the horizon) symbolizing open paths, journeys, and decisions that lead us away from the familiar.
- A golden in-between space that unifies both planes and suggests that decision-making, while rational, has an almost mystical dimension: something lights up, something darkens.
The piece dialogues with great themes of existential philosophy—choice, freedom, responsibility—but does so through a highly accessible visual language, allowing the viewer to project their own experience of doubt onto the work.
6.2. “Golden Tales”
The series “Golden Tales”, exhibited in Valencia, is presented in the press as “an art exhibition for the imagination.”
Although each painting has its own narrative, the series shares several features:
- Settings where the everyday is contaminated by the fantastic.
- The constant presence of gold as a narrative surface.
- Human or semi-human figures in situations of transit, waiting, or transformation.
The word “tales” is fitting because the paintings operate as condensed stories: there are characters, settings, and latent conflicts, but the resolution is never made explicit. The viewer completes the story guided by personal associations.
6.3. The mural at Valencia Airport
The intervention at Valencia Airport, associated with “Golden Surrealism,” stands out for its mural format and strategic location: a quintessential transit space where thousands of people cross a threshold between cities, countries, and lives every day.
In this piece:
- Figures seem to float in a turbulent space made of clouds, architectural fragments, and flying structures.
- Diagonal compositions lead the eye from one side to the other, generating a sense of journey.
- Intense colors (reds, blues, golds) reinforce the connection with the imagery of travel: sunrises, sunsets, emotional maps.
The mural works almost as a visual metaphor for the airport itself: a space where expectations, farewells, fears, and desires coexist, all of them traversed by a golden uncertainty.