An exhibition translating geological time into form, structure, and perception through rigorous abstraction.
WOODSTOCK, VA, UNITED STATES, January 26, 2026 /EINPresswire.com/ — Time can feel stable until you confront its depth. As Colloquia emerges from a long winter, Swiss artist Christian Vonarburg’s Strata – a speculative archaeology arrives with striking precision: a body of work shaped by accumulation rather than resolution, by layers laid down patiently over time.
Vonarburg’s practice is rooted in a non-narrative approach and a deep commitment to formal construction. His works are built through meticulously structured systems—non-overlapping geometric motifs in which form, colour, and structure operate with clarity and restraint. What initially reads as ordered and exacting opens into something more disorienting: an encounter with time unfolding at scales far beyond human experience.
The works in Strata draw on the geological imaginary—layers, fractures, accretions—not as representation, but as translation. Geological time is rendered through formal means alone: repeated motifs, rhythmic structures, and controlled colour propagation. Vonarburg does not depict geology; he converts its logic into visual systems that carry meaning without narrative.
To ground this temporal shift, the artist proposes a simple analogy: if a human life were compressed into one hundred seconds, humanity’s entire presence on Earth would last just over eleven days, while the formation of a single geological stratum would extend for more than thirty years. The resulting vertigo is perceptual rather than theatrical—a recognition of how brief human time becomes when placed inside planetary processes.
Yet Strata is not distant or abstract. Meaning emerges in the encounter itself. In the quiet interval between artwork and viewer, perception slows, attention sharpens, and complexity becomes legible rather than overwhelming. The work does not ask for interpretation; it establishes conditions in which interpretation can occur.
Most works in the exhibition are realized using risography, whose incremental layering echoes the sedimentary logic of the project. A small number incorporate xerography and pencil, extending the same structural concerns through different material means. Across media, precision and repetition function not as style, but as method—clarifying form and framing perception.
Strata marks a moment of emergence: a first exhibition of spring that reflects a season shaped by accumulation, compression, and gradual clarity. It is a meditation on time, structure, and the possibility of seeing complexity rendered both rigorous and quietly beautiful.
About the Artist:
Christian Vonarburg (b. 1967, Fribourg, Switzerland) lives and works in Etoy, near Lausanne. Trained in fine arts and architectural drafting, his work has been exhibited in Switzerland, Paris, New York, Amherst, and Guatemala City. He also serves as Course Development Manager at EPFL’s Center for Digital Education. His involvement in education has profoundly influenced his artistic approach, nurturing an ongoing reflection on knowledge and art as a vehicle for questioning it.
Exhibition Information:
Opening reception: March 7, 2026, 3–6 PM
Gallery access: By appointment only
Venue: Colloquia Art, 115 N Main Street, Woodstock VA
RSVP: colloquia.art
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