Natalja Scerbina holds a Bachelor’s degree in Art History and Visual Arts from Concordia University and has participated in solo and group exhibitions since 2006. Most recently, her works were included in the exhibition Hors Cadre: œuvres des artistes parmi nous at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts in September 2021. “De nos gestes fragiles” marks the beginning of her collaboration with Galerie Simon Blais.

ARTIST’S STATEMENT

My artistic approach explores the deep, intimate links between human beings and the nature that surrounds them. Through painting and my series, I take on a variety of fields: archaeology, explored in the Ce qui reste series; genetics, explored in Mutations and Fleurs carnivores; astronomy, with Danse lunaire and L'architecture de la nuit; and more recently, ecology and space in Fluages and Emballe(r) le paysage.
I create worlds of softness, darkness and mystery, oscillating between abstraction and figuration. My works reflect my questioning of the human footprint on the environment, as well as our relationship to beauty, the unknown and the subtleties of perception. They evoke both the imaginary forms of mutating cells and cosmic landscapes, where distant planets, stars and light become artistic matter.
In many works, the subject seems suspended in an almost two-dimensional space, frozen in a moment of inertia, precariously balanced on the threshold of movement. This detachment expresses a rupture: the subject is uprooted, detached from the world, ceasing to be one with it. Conversely, in other compositions, it's the environment itself that becomes the main protagonist: undefined, it manifests itself more as an atmosphere than a tangible place.
At first glance, these environments appear minimalist, almost empty. But on closer inspection, they reveal a wealth of detail, paradoxically abundant and uncluttered, as if one contained the other and vice versa.
The idea of transformation, of imminent change, is omnipresent in my research, as is a profound respect for the creative process itself. My work lies at the crossroads of the tangible and the imaginary, inviting us to reflect on our place in the universe and our relationship with that which is beyond us.