Lina Iris Viktor: Dark Mark Has Substance

Writer Shaquille Heath marries her poetic prose with the divine work of artist Lina Iris Viktor

In suspension we built a World in my image – a cornerstone. No. XLIII, 2018-2019, by Lina Iris Viktor

It cannot be reiterated often enough—there is not one singular way to look at a piece of art. Typically, I’ve found that if an artist's intention is to lock you inside a box of their thinking, they’ll tell you that directly. The obvious is not only noticeable. It is apparent not solely in the ethos, but in the substance. And if you are standing before a Lina Iris Viktor piece, there is one substance that her work forces you to understand. 

And I don’t mean the definition of “force” that coerces a viewer into believing in a substance against their will. It is beyond constraint. It is beyond pressure. And while you can, and you should, take away a galaxy of truths from Viktor’s work, the one that is the most evident is the power she breathes into Blackness. Upon looking at her work, you should understand that Blackness is not monolithic.

It is said that before a God created the Earth, there was only darkness. Before the Big Bang, tiny particles the size of mere millimeters sat densely together amongst this same vastness. Whatever account of human ideation you believe, and even the ones you don’t, start here: Before the you. Before the me. There was Black. Read the full piece in Juxtapoz right here.