Marko Šajn works in the fields of painting, printmaking, drawing and art publications. The central motif in his work is the human figure, which is highly stylised, even typified, as it always appears without facial features, with the same hairstyle and wearing the same clothing. The figure is located in an undefined space that corresponds to a canvas, where it assumes various positions from which we can recognise its emotions and moods, which are only expressed through its posture, gesture or movement. When it is accompanied by one or more other figures, they together form various compositions in which their relationships, (common) tendencies and actions are reflected through the visual language of their bodies. In these compositions, the artist keeps the choreography of the movements sufficiently loose to leave the interpretation of the relationships open – as it is not always clear whether the figures are friendly or hostile to each other, whether they are playing or fighting, wrestling or testing their strength, embracing or suffocating each other ... In view of this ambiguity, the artist's main aim seems to be to show the miscommunication between the figures, as it often occurs in our everyday lives.

This process is further intensified in the most recent works presented in the exhibition. In these paintings, the figures are so closely connected and intertwined that they form a kind of mass from which it is no longer possible to recognise the logical progression of the individual bodies. Thus, instead of the individual and their relationships with others, the collective, the human mass, comes to the fore, in which the individual loses its form.

It is no coincidence that the artist was diverted to these depictions via the Internet. The exhibited works are the result of his "collaboration" with artificial intelligence, more precisely, with the online platform gencraft.com. Based on the instructions entered (e.g. "3 human figures comforting each other") and the images found online, the platform produced an image that the artist then used as the basis for his painting. Interestingly, at first glance, the images produced by AI actually show what it was told to do (e.g. a group of human figures in an embrace), but closer inspection reveals a number of inaccuracies and errors, such as double limbs, too many fingers, strange feet, etc. Whilst the artist has corrected the physical anomalies in his paintings, he has retained the compositional ones – a limb still appears where it does not belong, or in a way that makes it physically impossible. This means that miscommunication is not limited to the realm of interpersonal relationships, but is an inherent part of all communication, including that which involves artificial intelligence.

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Marko Šajn (1990) enrolled on the Painting and Printmaking programme at the Academy of Fine Arts and Design in Ljubljana in 2011. His work has been shown in several solo exhibitions, including at Hiša kulture in Pivka (2019), DobraVaga Gallery (2019) and MGLC in Ljubljana (2023), as well as in group exhibitions, most notably Prints and Impressions 2, MGLC, Ljubljana (2022). He works at Hiša kulture in Pivka and as part of the risograph collective Riso Paradiso in Ljubljana. He lives and works in the countryside near Pivka.
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