View the online publication we released for the 20th anniversary of the painting competition Maľba.
1st place
Kováčiková Dominika
Instinct for Survival
2023, oil on canvas, 145 x 145 cm
(* 1996, Dolný Kubín)
2017 – 2021, studied at the Academy of Arts in Banská Bystrica (Department of Graphic Art), in P.Ševčík’s Studio of Graphic and Free Art. Since 2021 she has been continuing her studies in the Department of Painting, in the STARTUP Studio, led by Dozent Triaška. She has twice been a finalist in the Painting Competition (2022 and 2023).
Dominika Kováčiková communicates weighty themes courageously and authentically. She emphatically draws attention to the issues of violence committed against women, sexual traumas such as abuse and harassment, and feelings of discontent with one’s appearance, which are frequently the reason for eating disorders and occasionally self-harm. Typically she creates young female heroines, sometimes in acute situations stemming especially from the need to be understood and accepted, to belong somewhere, or equally to conform to the world (of adults). Despite her youth, Kováčiková presents powerful stories of credible heroines, issuing from her personal experience. The protagonists of her paintings are specific, but they speak of their own traumas comprehensibly and convincingly. Behind their mask of determination, one can sense vulnerability and the universal desire to be understood.
Her final entry Instinct for Survival (2023) is part of her wider (thesis-related) cycle Rohypnol Girls. Kováčiková creates two female figures, deliberately not portraying their faces, concentrating rather on the lower (anonymous) parts of their bodies. Despite this, her painting is striking and concrete. She sensitively draws attention to the problem of "lynching", humiliation and non-comprehension: not only on the part of the public, but also by people close to them (in school, family, community…). The artist is clearly aware of how women who are victims of violence are driven into isolation by negative reactions of this type: they are afraid to speak of their experiences; they remain in anonymity and loneliness. Kováčiková’s "heroines" are seemingly prepared for "revenge"; in their hands they hold a balisong (butterfly knife); outwardly they show strength and determination to overcome trauma and regain their dignity. But the details portrayed (ribbons in hair, girlish braids, cross on the neck, infantile underwear) evoke rather a sense of innocence and purity. Precisely this ambiguity, alongside the strong narrative line, is an essential quality of Kováčiková’s painting.
(The text is from the catalogue for the competition Painting 2023, N. Gažovičová)
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