Tomislav Topić
Born in 1985 in Hannover, Germany, Tomislav Topić is an artist whose practice evokes a comprehensive inquiry into colour and colour theory.
After studying colour design and applied science and art in Germany and the US, his curiosity was piqued by encounters with non-representational and American expressionist art. This combined with a history of being a graffiti writer during his youth, Tomislav developed a consequent agility and rhythmic movement of painting.
His process involves a calculative approach while determining what colour combinations to paint with. His mediums, whether canvas or a wall, diffuse a sharp gestural style of painting with gradients created using a variety of paints.
While painting Tomislav enters a state of deep immersion which is almost like a meditative act of control. The joy found in the process coupled with a search for the unknown remains undefined until the last moment. He notes, “The process is a play between chaos and clarity, between turmoil and ecstasy.” He allows his intuition to guide the gestures that make marks onto a surface, colliding two states of being — the child who resists rules and seeks to preserve an untamed sensation and the adult who has absorbed colours, experiences, and moments, now distilling and merging into a united singular expression.
Tomislav’s oeuvre as an independent artist and as part of the duo Quintessenz until 2020, he created numerous site-specific installations and murals worldwide. For more than a decade, the artist’s work has received increasing international recognition having exhibited his works with ArtNow Gallery, Berlin; DANYSZ Gallery, Paris; Straat Museum, Amsterdam; Foundation Fiminco, Paris, among others.
He has worked across installations and murals in festivals, exhibitions, and artist residencies in multiple countries like Germany, Switzerland, France, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, Greece, Mauritius, Qatar, Georgia, USA, and China, and now comes to India with Gallery XXL for his first solo exhibition in the country.