Nika Neelova, ‘Crude Hints’, 2024

Nika Neelova, Crude Hints, 2024

Reclaimed architectural salvage, natural stones, cast Jesmonite, earth pigments. Presented by NOIRE GALLERY  

About the Work

In the summer of 2023, during an excavation at a new development, a team from Museum of London Archaeology unearthed the largest ancient mosaic floor found in London in over half a century. The well-preserved interior floor maps the footprint of a mausoleum that occupied the site during the Roman period. In certain places a second mosaic was uncovered directly beneath the first – indicating that the floor of the structure was raised during its lifetime. Taking its inspiration from this find, Crude Hints explores the archaeology of liminal places between two stages of existence, where myth meets reality, where dreamscapes meet materiality, where worlds come close together. Multiple layers of re-imagined mosaic floors reconstructed from reclaimed construction site materials, natural stones and site-specific earthly pigments are woven together into a three-dimensional carpet, outlining the ghostly footprints of buildings that are no longer there.

The sculpture is conceived of as a speculative archaeological site, unearthing various debris and salvaged materials from lived-in environments. Stones are repositories of condensed, sedimented time. Stones flow through vast geological expanses carrying the debris of past worlds. Decay and erosion can be seen as a form of architecture, through which each stage of deconstruction is a stage of creation, within this vast flow of material exchanges everything is constantly undoing into something else and can only be temporarily perceived as whole. In Mediaeval literature, stones were widely described as the ‘bones of the earth’ preventing the land from pulling apart. Since ancient times, stones have been used as commemorative vessels to keep memory alive, outliving its human containers and bridging the antiquity of the planet and its distant future. 

About the Artist

Nika Neelova (b. 1987, Moscow; lives and works in London) is interested in the way materials and architecture influence our sense of time and place. Her work employs collection, examination and transfiguration. By employing found objects, Neelova transforms these items into works that challenge the viewer to contemplate their past functional use.  

Neelova has been awarded the Kenneth Armitage Young Sculptor Prize, the Land Security Prize Award, the Royal British Society of Sculptors Bursary Award and was the winner of Saatchi New Sensations. In 2017 Neelova attended an alternative study programme organized by the Wysing Art Centre in Cambridge. In 2019 she was awarded the Arts Council National Lottery Grant supporting the development of her practice. 

Her work has been exhibited in the United Kingdom and internationally, recent solo exhibitions include ‘Very Like a Whale’ at the Santorini Museum in Greece (2023), ‘Thaw’ at Noire Gallery in Turin (2023), ‘One of Many Fragments’ at the New Art Centre, Roche Court (2021), ‘Silt’ at Brighton CCA (2021), CELINE Art Project curated by Hedi Slimane for Celine London (2021), ‘[ъ] [ы] [ь]’ at Garage MCA (2021), ‘Ever’ at The Tetley, Leeds (2019), ‘Glyphs’ at Noire Gallery in Turin ( 2019).

Frieze Sculpture is in The Regent’s Park, 18 September – 27 October 2024. No booking required, free to all. 

EXPLORE FRIEZE SCULPTURE

Further Information 

Frieze Sculpture runs alongside Frieze London and Frieze Masters, 9 – 13 October.

Tickets to the fairs are on sale – buy yours now. Alternatively, become a member to enjoy premier access, exclusive guided tours and more.

BUY NOW

To keep up to date on all the latest news from Frieze, sign up to the newsletter at frieze.com, and follow @friezeofficial on Instagram, X and Frieze Official on Facebook.

^{Main Image: Nika Neelova, Lazarus Taxon II, 2023. Inner surfaces of reclaimed water pipes cast in jesmonite, wire cable. Dimensions variable. Courtesy: Noire. Photo: Luisa Porta}