In an era overwhelmed by images, by real or fake news, by the debate between reality and fiction, art questions itself and investigates new methods for evaluating the surrounding world. The art boundaries become more blurred.
The artists, facing an era of accumulation, are challenging the implications that arise from our society. They are questioning the meaning of information and the value of art. The common thread that connects the galleries exhibiting at LAW 2024 is the question: What are the boundaries of art today?
The following articles will guide the viewer on a thematic and in-depth journey through the galleries and the artists presented in the 10th edition of Luxembourg Art Week.
Starting with the Main Section, it is worth highlighting the presence of iconic international artists who have marked the art scene from the ‘50s: Galerie Boulakia (London), present for the first time at Luxembourg Art Week, features leading artists as Marc Chagall, Pablo Picasso, Georges Mathieu, Hans Hartung, Karel Appel, Joan Mirò as well as 2 contemporary painters: the Chinese LiFang with her large flat figurative compositions and the recent works by French artist Etienne Assénat.
Galerie Lelong & Co (Paris, New York) presents masterpieces by Pierre Alechinsky, a large format engraving from 1980; Etel Adnan with an oil on canvas from 2020, her work has also been presented at the Venice Biennale this year; a selection of Richard Serra engraving from 2022; a wooden massive sculpture by David Nash; acrylics by Jan Voss as well as a selection of works by Nancy Spero and Richard Tuttle. To name also the work by two young women artists: the totemic ancestral sculptures by Marion Verboom and the sober warm paintings by Christine Safa.
Ceysson & Bénétière (Paris, Luxembourg City, New York, Saint-Étienne) present artists such as Roger Bissière, Frank Stella, Bernar Venet, Claude Viallat, Nancy Graves, recent works by Robert Brandy; as well as young emerging artists such as Stephané Edith Conradie from Namibia with a selection of sculptures decorated with intertwined objects; surreal works by French artist Antwan Horfee; everyday life realistic paintings by Japanese artist Tomona Matsukawa and foreboding glamour acrylics by American artist Rachael Tarravechia.
Bernhard Knaus Fine Art (Frankfurt am Main) features established artists from the ’60s such as Mark Francis with new abstract paintings, the conceptual timeless photographs by Ralf Peters, the hybrid shaped drawings by Katja Davar, and from the ‘70s the multi-layered works by Myriam Holme as well as the colorful compositions by Robert Zandvliet.
Renowned international artists can also be found at DavisKlemmGallery (Wiesbaden) featuring recent works that include moving images by Julian Opie, the urban landscapes photographic objects by Hein Spellmann, the camouflage landscapes on aluminum panels by Konrad Winter, and the everyday blues sculptures by Petra Scheibe Teplitz.
Zidoun-Bossuyt Gallery (Dubai, Luxembourg, Paris) focuses on a selection of contemporary American painters who experiment with different techniques and materials the meaning of art boundaries: the two-dimensional figurative collages made out of woodblock prints, Japanese rice paper, muslin, and spray paint by Yashua Klos; the intimate portraits compositions created with pigmented watercolor collage layered on top of the canvases by YoYo Lander; the rhythmic configurations extracted from altered photographs by Nate Lewis; the symbolic black male portraits obtained through collage of magazine images, matchsticks, steel wool and soldered metal by Jeff Sonhouse; moments of daily life depicted incorporating painting, drawing, collage, printmaking, fabric and handmade papyrus by Khalif Tahir Thompson; the narrative female scenes by Summer Wheat obtained by a combination of multiple physical techniques applied on aluminum mesh.
Eva Steynen Gallery (Antwerp) showcases recent and new works of international painters who investigate the relation between perception and ‘seeing’: the colorful vibrant acrylic composition by Johannes Ulrich Kubiak in dialogue with Wannes Lecompte’s poetic canvases where the brushstrokes are applied as a symphony of alternation between full and empty spaces.
Victor Lope (Barcelona) features a dialogue between sculpture and painting through the Jacinto Moros’s curvilinear wooden sculptures that float in space like dynamic three-dimensional spirals; the life-size sculptures in wood or bronze by Mario Dilitz as a metaphor of human existence; the watercolors and ink on paper by Malgosia Jankowska as a recall of the fantastic fairy tales world, reactivating in our subconscious the sense of innocence and fear that are often dormant.
As new entries in the Main section: Alzueta Gallery (Barcelona, Madrid, Girona) showcases a booth based on imaginary worlds, dreams and unreal dimensions: harmonious sculptures by French artist Laurent Martin Lo, the surreal dreaming photographs by Spanish artists Andrea Torres, the geometrical compositions by Italian Mirco Marchelli and German Sabine Finkenauer.
Nanna Preußners (Hamburg) features a solo women presentation: Mojé Assefjah’s colorful works draw our gaze beyond the confines of the canvas to new visual horizons; Astrid Busch’s self-created pieces are stratification of pigments on paper or aluminum creating multiple nuances of tones and new layers of reading; Antje Blumenstein’s attractions re-establish a geometric order between lines, spaces, colors and lights.
Renard Hacker (Lille) presents a four-handed work by the two young artists (both under 35) Lara Bloy and Romain Bagouet on the relationship between the human being and the surrounding space; a series of large floral formats by Gaël Davrinche; the realistic oils on canvas by Katia Bourdarel, her latest series of paintings, which refer to collective and individual memory and the works on glass by Justin Weiler focused on an infinite dialogue of reflections and lights.
Take Off section: in the Au Cube (Mâcon) stand, the works speak about utopia and reflection, through a game of visibility and invisibility: Jochen Mühlenbrink's pictorial trompe l'oeil imitates reality, deceiving our eye towards something enigmatic, while Gongmo Zhou's paintings question identity and the distance that separates us from reality through a game of pictorial reflections that alter visibility.
3 new entries are worth mentioning: Camille Pouyfaucon (Paris) presents two young emerging painters: Eugénie Didier and Léa Toutain (both born in 2000) who depict scenes of everyday life, stimulating our perception to go beyond the banal, the mundane, towards intimate but at the same time universal visual narratives.
Grège Gallery (Bruxelles) set up a collective exhibition of its artists: a dialogue between the organic sculptures of Sepa and the raw minimal ceramics of Laura Pasquino, the anthropomorphic drawings of Chidy Wayne, the intimate unfinished portraits of Juliette Lemontey, the abstract evanescence of Giorgio Petracci and the visionary compositions of Moritz Berg.
no/mad utopia (Beirut) highlights the Lebanese art scene through the works of 3 women artists based in Beirut: Johanne Allard addresses political and social issues through the delicate and meticulous technique of embroidery on canvas or metal, Dalia Baasiri's drawings become ideological manifestos on the fragility of her country and Ieva Saudargaite Douhaihi's photographic documentation is a visual diary of the urban transformation of Beirut.
All works are available in our catalogue, unveil soon.
By Emanuela Mazzonis
