What does the eye notice first: color or form? One could debate this endlessly, but from September 1 to 20, the BIS ART gallery invites you to explore the question at Daria Semenova’s solo exhibition, «Before the World Is Named».
Sometimes a face becomes familiar before its individual features have even coalesced into a unified image. Just as the first rays of the sun signal the arrival of morning while the landscape remains veiled in mist, there are moments when a sensation arises before a clear image takes shape, and recognition outpaces understanding. Encountering color evokes a similar question: what appears first—the color itself, or the vague premonition of a form being born within it?
Some patches of color seem to step forward to meet the gaze before the mind can even interpret what is being seen. Others hold back, as if their outlines are not yet ready to fully emerge. An image slowly reveals itself from within them, much like a melody formed from individual notes. In that fleeting interval between the initial impression of color and the recognition of form, a unique feeling arises—one cannot yet name what is seen, yet there is already a sense of encountering something familiar.
The exhibition «Before the World Is Named» focuses on that precise moment when color first meets the eye, while the image is still in the process of emerging. In Daria Semenova’s works, color becomes a space of encounter between the visual reality and what arises in the imagination. It holds impressions, memories, and unspoken associations that gradually coalesce into an image.
Curator: Natalia Tarasova
Winzavod, Entrance E11