NEDA NIKOLIC

ARTIST STATEMENT

My works explore the spaces between childhood and womanhood, memory and loss, fear and imagination. I am interested in the way certain experiences remain with us, often returning unexpectedly in fragments.

Songs play an important role in this process. Long after the music has stopped, individual lines can remain in memory. A phrase heard years ago may suddenly return at an unexpected moment, carrying a different meaning than it once did. Over time, lyrics become connected to personal experiences, emotions and memories. Detached from their original context, they take on a new life.

Fragments of song lyrics appear throughout my paintings, sometimes clearly visible and sometimes almost disappearing beneath layers of paint. I write, cover, erase and repeat them until the words become part of the surface itself. Language turns into material, gesture and texture, like traces of writing left behind on walls.

I think of memory in a similar way. It is never complete or fixed. Some things disappear, while others return without warning. A word, a sound or an image can suddenly open a connection to something that seemed forgotten.

Water is another important element in these works. It suggests movement, transformation and connection, but also uncertainty. Its surface can appear calm while concealing something beneath it. This tension between the visible and the hidden connects water to memory and fear.

I am interested in the feeling of an unseen presence and in the fragile boundaries between safety and danger, protection and control. The painted surface becomes a place where memories, words and emotions accumulate.

Like water, memory is constantly moving. It changes shape, disappears and returns, leaving traces behind.