Artists

Ádám Varga

Press release

Ádám Varga’s latest series focuses on pinball machines, and more specifically on their visual dimension and the question of how they can be translated into two-dimensional form. The history of pinball can be traced back to the eighteenth-century French game of bagatelle, while the modern coin-operated pinball machine emerged in the first decades of the twentieth century. In 1947, the Gottlieb company’s Humpty Dumpty was the first machine to feature electromagnetically operated flippers. From this point on, players could not only launch or nudge the ball, but also directly intervene in its movement. The exhibited works emerge from this peculiar system. Each painting develops a distinct visual language, while a common structure and central question bind them together: how can a functioning system governed by rules be represented as an image? In recent years, the problem of spatial representation has become increasingly important in his practice from a technical perspective. Combining plotter-based processes with painting, he creates flat surfaces that produce increasingly complex spatial experiences. The overlapping elements of the playfields, different systems of lines, transparencies, and occlusions create depth, as if the interior of an actual machine were revealed behind the surface of the canvas. The details of the pinball playfields can be traced with almost perfect precision. The possible trajectories of the ball, ramps, bumpers, flippers, tunnels, and other game elements appear not merely as recognisable motifs, but as parts of a functioning system, allowing us to mentally follow the path of the ball through the playfield. The works in the series are defined by five distinctive colours: green, blue, pink, grey, and yellow. Colour studies play an important role in the artworks, and the individual paintings evoke different visual worlds: grey recalls the character of mechanical machinery, pink the visual language of toys and emojis, while green suggests the abstract structures of sports fields. Blue and yellow, meanwhile, can be understood as metaphors for colour scales. The gesture of appropriation characteristic of Varga’s practice also appears in these works. Among the details of the playfields, we encounter references to popular culture. Two characters from Pokémon are evoked, for example: Vileplume can be recognised against the background of the blue painting, while Jigglypuff appears in the pink one. Textual elements are incorporated into the paintings in a similar way. In the green version, the words “Greatland” and “sport” can be made out, while the yellow painting contains the words “hello” and “lock up.” At first glance, these motifs may appear to be hidden details, but on closer inspection they open up further layers of association. Each offers another point of entry, and the paintings can thus be continually broken down and reinterpreted, almost without end. Ultimately, the exhibited works translate the tension between design and unpredictability, system and deviation, reproducible form and unique artwork into the language of painting. They do not simply depict a game; they become complex systems in which the eye, like a pinball, continuously searches for new and alternative paths. Boglárka Tóth Ádám Varga (1995) Ádám Varga studied painting at the Hungarian University of Fine Arts between 2014 and 2019 and was a visiting student at the Art Academy of Latvia in Riga in 2017. In 2019 he was an intern at the Galerie für Zeitgenössische Kunst in Leipzig. He was awarded the Derkovits Scholarship between 2021 and 2024, and in 2022 he was shortlisted for the MODEM prize by the MODEM Center for Modern and Contemporary Art in Debrecen. In addition to his artistic activities, he is a member of the PINCE artist-run space in Budapest and has helped in the realisation of several independent exhibitions and projects. The focus of his work is on the role of production and reproduction in art by means of diverse painting projects, shedding light on the dialectical relationship between the two concepts and the irresolvable nature of their various contradictions. He seeks to develop contexts that are closely related to the neutrality of the process of production, the role of digitalisation in painting, and the questioning of authenticity. He uses definitions, files, digital images, computer games and diagrams as his sources. In recent years, he has been using a plotter to assist him in creating his paintings. In addition to the plotter’s use for its intended purpose, experimentation with additional functions is also an important factor. His work can also be seen as a questioning of the very nature of painting, where the aim is to map out a technical and conceptual spectrum that exposes the tension between the reproduced character of the mass-produced product and the uniqueness of the original artwork.