M A L I N A B O R E Y K OUntitled

What is a line?

There are logical definitions of a line, physical and rational formulas for a line. But I see a line as more than a connection between two points. A line is more of a mnemonic device. We recognize lines everywhere within everything and everyone. Lines aid us in the act of remembering or associating. It’s almost overwhelming and squelching when you think about it. So the term “line”, in my eyes, is a human construct because in fact, a line is all of life and actuality.

Are your contributions to a drawing or painting more important than the negative space?

The negative space is always foremost. I’m just creating a vehicle of visibility – aiding the audience in seeing what is already there.

You have a rather specific way of inviting interpretation. The difference between Abstract Expressionism, for instance, and your work is not the starting point but the way to interpretation; where abstractors derive representation largely from gestural elements innate to their medium, you also provide elements from the real world that we recognize. Your forms have shading. They drape. They offer some sense of real space. By way of experimentation, I showed your work to several people, and they all see something different – but quickly, is the strange thing. It seems like they want to see something real, though, again, no two people ever agree. What do you make of that?

I think that if this is how people react, then good: my art serves its purpose. Rothko wanted his audience to engage, not assume or speculate, but really engage. I want my output to force audiences into recognizing that we are constantly making associations and connections. This is good! Our transmitters are firing away rapidly. I also enjoy dialogue. I want people to see a constant metamorphosis of line. As we age, the line ages and the piece converses with impermanence.

You don’t take care of your pieces when they’re done, in the traditional sense. Anyone who walks into your apartment can find them tacked up to doors/walls, buried under the bed, creased, etc. Why?

I don’t care because the term “art” is loose. These are not permanent items. Actually, they are just that – items, objects. Is this output even art or is it just something that happens when I put my hand to paper and stop thinking? It’s a type of meditation and no one keeps their thoughts bottled in jars.

I know you love nothing more than to start with a big white space. Walls, even. Is that because you like to improvise? Do you begin by working from inside the work or by plan/visualization?

I began drawing details on the most minuscule scale. My head was inevitably wrapped into detail, a love of detail. An amazing professor at Skidmore College, Janet Sorensen, took me under her wing in a series of independent studies. Understanding my loyalty and attraction to minute line, Janet cultivated an approach to those lines in relation to scale and space. My focus turned to composing work depicting the microorganism encompassed by an organic whole. Prints of flowers decaying became roaring seascapes when viewed at a different angle. From that point, I recklessly stopped fearing large space. An approach to a large wall is like an empty notebook; the first page is beautiful and pristine. You want to keep it this way because you know the rest of the pages will be marked, smudged, and torn. In a way, it takes getting over that first page and creating a mark with the full knowledge that this serenity in paper is undergoing a transformation, not destruction.

A large white wall is the same; once I overcame the ‘first page,’ I went crazy working as large as possible.

I won’t lie, though – I still leave some of my first pages in notebooks blank...

Tatusian ResidenceNew York City

All artwork © Malina Boreyko 2011Photographs by Emily Peters and Paul WaxDesign & interview by BF Bifocalswww.bfbifocals.com