Forces in Scape I-II, 2017

Acrylic-painted plaster relief – 215 × 300 × 70 mm each

Bónyai Barbara’s diptych Forces in Scape I–II is a sculptural experiment situated at the intersection of painting and sculpture, offering a subjective and sensory reinterpretation of the natural environment. Through the representation of two distinctive landscapes in Budakeszi – the town where the artist resides – Bónyai captures not only the visual imprints of nature but also seeks to embody the palpable energies and underlying force-fields that animate the terrain.

The works stand out for their exceptional technical approach: instead of conventional modeling techniques, Bónyai “painted” the plaster with a brush in a pastose, sculptural manner, embedding plastic gestures directly into the process of form-making. These textured surfaces were then saturated with expressive, dynamic layers of acrylic paint, whose chromatic modulation and rhythmic articulation echo the visual language of gestural painting and expressionism. This hybrid approach dissolves the boundaries between volume and surface, challenging traditional distinctions between the mediums.

As part of the Popicon cycle – an overarching body of work spanning from 2011 to 2022 – the diptych gains further conceptual depth. This period in Bónyai’s oeuvre is marked by the deliberate tension between the aesthetics of popular culture and philosophical inquiry. While Forces in Scape may initially read as a form of landscape abstraction, it is, in essence, a personal geopoetic act: nature here is not a subject of representation but a visual field through which inner energy flows are made manifest.

Beneath the visually striking, decoratively charged surfaces – which also gesture toward the language of contemporary pop aesthetics – lie more profound metaphysical and perceptual dimensions. The landscape becomes a resonance field, an imprint of memory and vibration, where the genius loci – the spirit of place – intersects with individual embodied perception. The fusion of plaster and acrylic is thus more than a formal innovation; it is an ontological stance on the unity of material reality and sensory experience.

In this sense, Forces in Scape I–II is not only an intermedial work in form but also in worldview. By transcending classical genre categories, Bónyai articulates a new visual consciousness that is at once personal and universal, intuitive and conceptual, painterly and sculptural.