Yavorsky’s work rejects academic figurative representation and embraces the semi-abstract method of composition that Malevich termed the ‘additional element' of painting. Yavorsky scatters particles of local colour with well-defined contours, to form purely abstract clusters of elements. These bursts of colour collect into patterned layers and are combined until their superposition is balanced on entirely abstract terms. The human tendency to seek patterns in random data and find figurative fulfilment is subtly emphasised by the artist. Yavorsky however, diverts this process as her paintings reach a closure before the figurative is able to become literal. She combines and contrasts the spectral allegorical figures with images of animals blended into the background by their realistically rendered camouflage. Through this process Yavorsky achieves a collection of paintings that are a complex and contemporary mixture of the figurative and the abstract.

The artist has experimented with multiple layers of patterning, perforation and texture that simultaneously stress the surface of the painting and dissolve it. Each painting appears to have several surfaces, which hang over one another like gossamer curtains, while the faded, mysterious figures at the centre unite these diverse elements into a single, ethereal composition.

New exhibition by Sveta Yavorsky, ‘I Tempi’, presents monochromous calligraphic floral patterns. Subtle variation in flow and density of entangled elements produce distinct "tempo" in each painting. The elements themselves are abstract black ink particles, like individual notes, if looked up closely, but observed from distance they chisel floral forms from whiteness of the canvas like distant chimes carve chords from silence.

‘Sveta Yavorsky is one of the most interesting and important contemporary artists working in London. Her exhibitions should not be missed’ (Art of England, Issue 64, 2009)

Sveta Yavorsky was born in Russia and studied art and architecture at the Moscow University of Architecture. She moved to London in 1992 as a fine artist, with her architectural training contributing to and informing her fascination with the use of geometric patterns within figurative composition. From careful study of Kandinsky’s theory of colour, Yavorsky then developed from this, her own idea of how colours and their various combinations, affect the psyche.