Eureka Threshold by Iabadiou Piko

Self-taught Indonesian painter Iabadiou Piko translates his environment into an effervescent language of figurative symbols and whimsical shapes executed in a vibrant color palette. His dynamic street abstracts evoke childhood memories of the joys of lighthearted doodling arising from the primary need for pure creative expression. Eureka Threshold is a series inspired by the paradoxes of boisterous urban life; “dialectical themes in the form of abstract paintings” in the words of the artist. These “noisy” works mark Piko’s artistic journey over the last five years.

Born out of a subliminal impulse, the rhythmic compositions of Eureka Threshold mimic the propagating deformation of sound waves. The line becomes a powerful expression of movement and tension that binds together the areas of color, shape and texture, bringing untamed artistic energies into a harmonious coexistence on the canvas. Piko’s most recent paintings display new figurative elements that resemble mythical beasts, the inhabitants of the artist’s spontaneous sceneries. 

Iabadiou Piko works on multiple paintings simultaneously, describing his creative process as building metaphysical trigger-spaces out of broken lines, sharp curves and dense textures. This series is an aesthetic investigation that aims to “redefine the essences of self-reliance in urban communities” and to examine “the internal reality of humanity in relation to life.”

Eureka Threshold is also a deeply personal exploration of traumatic memories from the artist’s childhood. Piko intends to channel his rage and bitterness through his rich, emotionally charged palette in which the color blue possesses a place of particular importance. It represents the phobia of narrow spaces that the artist developed after he almost drowned in a river as a child: in Piko’s paintings, the blue fields of paint are turbulent currents that threaten to carry the artist away. This personal connection with color is one of the many similarities between Iabadiou Piko and Pablo Picasso, who together with Basquiat, Dubuffet and Twombly acts as a major influence in the vivid and constantly evolving oeuvre of the Indonesian artist.