b. 1990, Norwich, UK; lives and works in London

2016-2017 City & Guilds of London Art School, MA
2010-2013 The Heatherley School of Fine Art, London

Since completing her master’s degree in 2017, London-based artist Yukhnovich has received acclaim for paintings in which she adopts the language of Rococo, reimagining the dynamism of works by eighteenth-century artists such as Giovanni Battista Tiepolo, François Boucher, Nicolas Lancret and Jean-Antoine Watteau, through a filter of contemporary cultural references including film, food and consumerism. She has recently spent time as artist-in-residence in Venice by invitation of Victoria Miro gallery and had the opportunity to engage in-depth with works that were influencing her already from afar.

Flora Yukhnovich is typically known for her large-scale canvases but for this year’s Cure3, Yukhnovich has managed to compress her broader vision into the compact Fragolina. The shape of the cube reminded the artist of a vitrine, “something which contains and preserves”; this interpretation enabled her to deviate from painting on canvas to creating a three-dimensional work. This particular piece was a response to Tiepolo’s painting Apollo and the Continents. By painting the outside of the cube, she renders the unattainable, revered artwork into something small and tangible, “small enough to hold in two hands”. The artist creates an illusion within the work; from far away it appears to be a Rococo painting, but from close-up, it is in fact an abstract work. In Yukhnovich’s words, “I’m really trying to preserve the experience of being surrounded and immersed in those paintings”.


www.florayukhnovich.com

Portrait courtesy the Artist