Day 90 of War, 2022 (24.05.22)


Ukrainian soil and oil on wooden board
40 x 30 cm/ 16 x 12 in.

Alina Zamanova is a Ukrainian artist who lives and works in Kyiv, Ukraine.

Since the 24th of February, 2022, Zamanova has been documenting the full-scale invasion war in her home Ukraine. Directly from Ukraine, she is responding to the horrific but at the same time heroic scenes from occupied cities where Ukrainian people are protecting the freedom and future of the whole democratic world.

The work and the life of an artist, and all of the people of Ukraine, were forcefully disrupted in one night and will never be the same. During the first 5 months of the war Zamanova was working from the place in the western part of Ukraine, where she evacuated with her family. Zamanova paints children and women whose lives were damaged or lost; she shows the pain of the families and searches for any possible freedom for their souls through art. Their spirits must be forever engraved in our memories. The world must see the truth and never close its eyes.

During the evacuation, an artist started painting the self-portrait series with Ukrainian soil, like a visual diary dedicating each portrait to a day she made it on during the war. Such self-portraits are not the same as "before"; they expose her collected pain and sufferings for all Ukrainian people, which are seen in the painted heavy eyes, imperfect skin, and tense facial muscles. 'Before and after' is now widely used within the Ukrainian community referring to life before the 24th of February and after the full-scale invasion started, and Zamanova's art was instinctively divided in such directions too. Now Zamanova is back in Kyiv and keeps working on new paintings and volunteering.

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Dim, 2022

Oil on linen
127 x 102 cm / 50 x 40 in.

Represented by Almine Rech

Amanda Wall was born 1985, Hood River, Oregon.

Amanda Wall is an American self-taught painter who lives and works in Los Angeles, California. A heady mix of voyeurism, exhibitionism and 21st century existentialism, Wall's work exposes the intimate and uncanny. With a shock of lurid colors in contrast to tender flesh tones, Wall's distinctive palette touches on the nerve of vulnerability, desire and control. The subject matter, however, remains shadowy - a tension between abstraction and distorted reality, a conflict between the self and the void.

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Feelings For You, 2022

Oil paint on linen
120 x 90 cm / 48 x 36 in.

Represented by Almine Rech

Chloe Wise’s practice spans diverse media, including painting, sculpture, video and installation.

Foregrounding an interest in the history of portraiture, Wise examines the multiple channels that lead to the construction of a Self, paying particular attention to the interweaving of consumption and image making. With a wry sense of humour, she nods to canonical tableaux, like Manet’s Déjeuner Sur L’Herbe, exploring the shared projected desires built around food and the female body. Meticulously hand painted casts of food serve as the base for the artist’s sculptural practice where strange assemblies, now frozen in sculpted plastic, toy with the presence and absence of unchangeability and perishability, fiction and reality. Advertising, fashion, taboo, multi-national brands—Wise looks to the consumptive habits built around these structures with parody and derision, underlying how the body is framed and becomes excessive in its manipulation of these sites.

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Pieno di vuoto, 2020

Mixed media on mulberry Hanji paper
140 x 200 cm / 55 x 79 in.

Represented by Almine Rech

Born in South Korea and working in Italy, Minjung Kim is well-known for her layered translucent ink works. Often using traditional Korean Hanji paper in her paintings, the flow and perceived three-dimensionality of her works evoke a sense of serenity that embraces light and space. The pleasing color palette is subdued and gentle while maintaining a powerful representation of beauty and commentary on her vision of the world.

Kim's Korean heritage paired with her study of Western art while in Italy, allows for her work to flourish through elements of both cultural spheres, and this successful coalescence is clearly brought forward in Kim’s captivating paintings. 

Over the past two decades, she has presented her works in Italy, Switzerland, China, the UK, the US, and Israel, among other countries. She has been the subject of solo exhibitions at renowned museums around the world, including Macro (Museo d’Arte Contemporanea Roma), Rome, Italy (2012); Hermès Foundation, Singapore (2017); Langen Foundation, Neuss, Germany (2019); and Hill Art Foundation, New York, US (2020). 

She introduced her works in Korea in the exhibition Traces (2015) at OCI Museum of Art, Seoul, South Korea; and the international invitational exhibition Making the Void, Filling the Void (2018) at Gwangju Museum of Art, Gwangju, Korea. Kim's presentation at The Light, The Shade, The Depth at Palazzo Caboto in Venice, Italy, curated by Jean-Christophe Ammann, received particularly enthusiastic international reviews. She has also participated in the Gwangju Biennale in 2004 and 2018. 

Her works are included in the collections of major institutions such as the British Museum in London, UK; Hill Art Foundation and Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art in New York, Princeton University Art Museum in New Jersey, Rhode Island School of Design Museum in Rhode Island, US, among others.

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Dreaming of Spring with Birds, 2022

Acrylic on canvas
150 x 150 cm / 59 x 59 in.

Represented by Almine Rech

Genieve Figgis’ paintings share a similar dramatic bent as some Irish-English literature subjects from Edgar Allan Poe to Oscar Wilde, as well as acknowledged Old Masters such as Goya. Working in oil and acrylic and at small- to mid-scale, Genieve Figgis produces paintings rich in color, texture, humor, and the macabre. Through her work, she explores and sends-up the idealization of luxury and leisure in paintings and photographs throughout art history. Like these historical works, her paintings feature sumptuous domestic interiors and stately country homes, idyllic natural settings, and protagonists dressed in finery and engaged in such activities as feasting, horseback riding, playing piano, or attending a party. Figgis’s body of work also includes her take on the tradition of portraiture and the odalisque. In her compositions, however, all is not well. Her figures appear either faceless or as foolishly grinning, ghoul-like creatures, whose loosely rendered forms seem vulnerable and insubstantial as they merge with their lushly painted, semi-abstract surroundings.
 

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You are a pearl and I wanna be around you like a shell (A painting of unrequited love), 2022

Oil on canvas
140 x 120 cm / 55 x 47 In.

Born in Canada, Shelby Seu paints hyperreal, symbolist portraits that reflect the intimate connection she fosters with her subject matter. Her oil paintings act as a mode of personal inquiry into how we view our existence, relationship to the world, and the passage of time.

She received her BFA in Painting from the Maryland Institute College of Art (2011) and her MFA in Fine Art from Goldsmiths College (2015). Seu has participated in programmes at the Institute of Contemporary Art Moscow, Yale University Norfolk and Central Saint Martins. She currently lives and works in Berlin, Germany.

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Chaos Reigns, 2022

Oil, Acrylic, Swarovski Crystals, Archival CMYK Ink on Canvas
165 x 132 cm / 65 x 52 in.

Allison Zuckerman is an American contemporary artist. Her work takes art historical paintings and internet culture as a point of departure, utilizing both paint and digitally manipulated images to create acerbic, hybrid portraits, brimming with cultural and societal critique. These colorful pop collages are created from fragments of Zuckerman’s past work, imagery of iconic paintings, and overlaid entirely with paint. Zuckerman’s knowledge of art history and popular culture is deployed with sly ambiguity, alternating between reverence and shrewd criticism.
 
Shortly after receiving her MFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Zuckerman attracted the interest of the influential art patrons Don and Mera Rubell, who offered her a residency at their Miami museum. Zuckerman has presented work in galleries across the globe and has exhibited her work in solo museum shows at The Akron Art Museum, The Herzliya Museum of Contemporary Art, The University of Florida in Gainesville, and the Rubell Museum. Some of her notable collaborations include Veuve Clicquot, TODs, Charli XCX, Elle USA, and Vogue Italia.

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In Full Bloom, 2022

Quilt with sustainable fabrics 
239 x 147 cm/ 94 x 58 in. 
249 x 157 cm/ 98 x 62 in. (framed)

Represented by Almine Rech

Born 1955, Phyllis Stephens is a fifth-generation quilt maker who lives and works in Atlanta, Georgia. She is considered to be a master of African American story quilts and has quilted professionally for more than thirty years. Stephens is proud to have been a part of the "Water is Life" exhibition which opened in 2016 in Geneva, Switzerland and subsequently traveled to France, Italy, Canada, Israel, Mexico and the U.S. Her work has been shown at museums such as The National Quilt Museum in Paducah, Kentucky—considered to have one of the world’s top quilt displays—as well as the National Museum of Ghana in Accra. In 2010, Stephens was awarded a resolution by the Georgia House of Representatives for her print portfolio, For Crying Out Loud , a tribute to the Children of the Civil Rights Movement. 

Notable collectors of Stephens’s work include Ric Lewis, Beth Rudin DeWoody, Oprah Winfrey, Arthur Lewis, Samuel L. and LaTanya Jackson, Denzel, and Aretha Franklin. Her work is in the corporate and museum collections of New York; Citicorp Group, New York; and the National Museum of Ghana, amongst others.

“I start every single quilt with a prayer. Prayer is what fuels my inspiration. Secondly, I am very thoughtful with every part of the quilting process—which includes, but is not limited to —the idea, the sketch, the fabric and thread selections, and the layout. The process continues with cutting each piece, placing the cut pieces properly, sewing, sizing, and—ultimately—the signing of my name. I have absolutely no idea how long it takes to create a quilt. I sometimes will take a guess, but rarely am I correct. It usually turns out to be much longer than I previously thought. There are variables in quilt making, and the variables differ with each quilt. There are many changes made before completion. I always follow my heart and instinct; therefore, a timeline is the last thing on my mind. 

I am also sensitive to my surroundings as well as the current environment and culture; however, I always take care to add or include the past. I want to honor the things, people, events, places, and circumstances that shaped the life I get to live freely. I like to remember the sacrifices that were made for me. The most exciting aspect of quilt making is that it is a true learning experience—one that is forever changing. The process changes; it is invented, then re-invented, over and over again. I am most grateful because my life is a very beautiful artistic journey. This thing I refer to as “Story Quilt Making” has been an amazing, adventurous and wonderful ride."

Stephens’ fabric selections are central to her work. They help her present the stories she wants to tell, and their quality reflects the beauty and intricacy of her stories. Her fabrics are also painstakingly chosen for their sustainability. 

According to Stephens, the most important part of her process is towards the end, when she is “resting with the quilt,” or spending a couple of days just looking it over after it appears to be finished. It’s during this time that she decides whether it is indeed complete and tells her story. Stephens also finds the process of quilting to be transportive. According to her, “Quilting is sometimes thought of as a hard, long, drawn- out process. Not for me. I am an heir to the culture and value of the African tradition of quilt making. The long process of quilting allows me time to travel to some of the sweetest places in my memories, like the quilting parties I enjoyed as a little girl. It was there that sewing hands and tall tales flowed one and the same. I enjoy every part, every process, and the special privilege of creating a quilt.”

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CAMO 35, 2021

Photography, Jet Ink Print of FineArt RAG+ MATT 310g mounted on dibond, american black box
Ed. 2/3 
150 x 100 cm / 59 x 39 in.

Represented by 193 Gallery

Thandiwe Muriu is a photographer born and raised in Nairobi, Kenya. As a female artist operating in a previously male-dominated field, she is passionate about celebrating and empowering her fellow women.

In her CAMO series, Thandiwe showcases Africa’s unique mix of vibrant cultures, textiles and beauty norms. Through her work she celebrates her African heritage and tackles important issues such as identity and self-perception using the rich colours and vibrancy the continent is so well known for.

Drawing inspiration from African textiles, everyday objects and traditional hairstyles, Thandiwe explores how the individual can lose their identity to culture. In her work she not only explores who she is as an artist, but also as a black woman. Through CAMO, Thandiwe aims to reclaim the self-love of the African woman who is often excluded from beauty standards in her own country.

The accessories in Thandiwe’s work are inspired by the objects Kenyans interact with in their everyday life, where one object can have multiple uses beyond its original purpose. The Artist explains that this creative recycling is commonplace for a population often lacking in means- "When you have little, you transform and reuse it. "

Lastly, passionate about the rich history of traditional, architectural hairstyles that are being forgotten, Thandiwe was inspired to incorporate modern forms of these hairstyles into her work in a process the Artist refers to as ‘modernizing history’- drawing from historical elements to inform future generations about the past.

Through a vivid aesthetic, the Artist takes you on a colourful journey through her world as a woman living in modern Africa as she reinterprets contemporary African portraiture.

"Where you sit when you are old shows where you stood in youth."
African Proverb.

Representing fond memories of the Artist's mother's hair salon routine, the electric blue eyewear of Camo 35 were created from plastic hair rollers in honour of the then highly fashionable hairstyle from the 90's known as Curly Kit. The Artist holds fond memories of sitting at the hair salon watching her mother put these same type of rollers into her hair, patiently sit under the dryer before walking out with her permed tresses wound into the large bouncy curls signature of the style.

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Obstacles in the World of Form, 2022

Oil on linen
102 x 76 cm / 40 x 30 in.

Represented by Almine Rech

Haley Josephs was born in 1987, and lives and works in New York. Drawing inspiration from notions of transformation, mortality, and femininity, Haley Josephs paints solitary figures in fantastical yet foreboding environments that transcend time and space. A recurring character within Josephs' work is the artist's late sister, who is often evoked in bold, almost daring, portraits that amalgamate intimate and personal narratives of the artist with the universal human condition. Her enigmatic paintings are colorful and whimsical yet also present a dark twist. An underlying sense of power and balance pervades her works, hinting at a moment of liberation from one’s ostensibly everlasting psychological conflicts. Josephs' paintings have been exhibited internationally, including at the Cleveland Institute of Art. Her work is in the collection of the X Museum, Beijing.

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Handlickers From Way Back, 2021

Oil on wood panel, suede, pipe cleaners, wood, clay, nails, metal brackets, artist's frame
76 x 59 x 13 cm/ 30 x 23 x 5 in.

Represented by Clearing Gallery

Daisy May Sheff born 1996 in Greenbrae, CA, lives and works in Inverness, CA.

She received her BFA from UCLA in 2018.

Solo exhibitions of her work have been held at White Columns, New York, South Willard, Los Angeles, and Ratio 3, San Francisco. Her work has been featured in group exhibitions at Ratio 3 DTLA, Los Angeles; Grimm Gallery, New York; Ratio 3, San Francisco; February, Austin; and C L E A R I N G, New York.

In 2022 she will have a solo at C L E A R I N G, Beverly Hills.

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Heart of a Star (zigzag/ jungle series), 2019

Acrylic on canvas
244 x 163 x 4.5 cm / 96 x 64 x 2 in.

Represented by König Gallery

Claudia Comte was born in 1983 in Grancy, Switzerland and is based in the countryside outside of Basel, Switzerland. The artist has recently presented her work in solo exhibitions at Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid (2021); Kunstraum Dornbirn, Dornbirn (2020); Castello di Rivoli - Museo D ́Arte Contemporanea, Rivoli (2019); Copenhagen Contemporary, Copenhagen (2019); Contemporary Art Museum, St. Louis, USA (2018); Kunstmuseum Luzern, Luzern (2017); Haus Konstruktiv, Zurich (2014); amongst many others.

The artist participated in international group exhibitions, such as Desert X, Al Ula, Saudi Arabia (2022); the 58th October Salon – Belgrade Biennale, Belgrade, Serbia (2021), and many more.

Comte’s works are part of renowned collections such as those of the Baltimore Museum, Baltimore; Haus Konstruktiv, Zurich; or the MoMA – Museum of Modern Art, New York. She won the Kulturförderpreis from the Alexander Clavel Stiftung (Riehen, Switzerland) in 2018 and was awarded the Swiss Art Award in 2014 and the Kiefer Hablitzel Award in 2012. She was also honoured by the UBS Foundation for Contemporary Art (Switzerland) in 2012.

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Undone, 2022

Procion dye & gold mica powder on canvas
208 x 170 cm / 82 x 67 in.
Signed on reverse

Represented by Almine Rech

Alexis McGrigg is a contemporary artist who explores themes of blackness, space, spirituality, identity, and collective consciousness. Her artwork utilizes the mediums of painting, drawing, transmedia, and installation to explore the multiplicity of blackness through figurative abstraction and conceptual narratives. She integrates poetry, sound, and performance in her practice as major contributors of influence throughout her research. 

Her artwork is included in several private collections and has been featured in exhibitions across the U.S. in New York, NY, New Orleans, LA, Chicago, IL, Las Vegas, NV, and Oakland, CA – most recently in the group exhibitions, SAY IT LOUD, at Christie’s Auction House, Seeing 20/20 at the Lauren Rogers Museum of Art, Wealth Surrounds Me: God, Gold & Kinfolk at Richard Beavers Gallery, and LIGHT at the Czong Institute for Contemporary Art (CICA) in South Korea.

Alexis earned her Bachelor of Fine Art in Painting from Mississippi State University in 2012 and a Master of Fine Art with a concentration in Painting and Transmedia from Texas Tech University in 2017.

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Rainbow Herbicides, 2022

Graphite on Canson paper, spray paint
127 x 100 cm / 50 x 40 In.
(Unframed)

Represented by Almine Rech

Thu Van Tran was born in 1979 in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. She lives and works in Paris, France. 
Working across a range of forms and materials, Tran uses her own experience as a cultural outsider - a Vietnamese woman living in France - to explore physical and cultural displacement and history of colonialism, subjects that have become poignantly relevant in today's climate.

Works by Thu Van Tran currently feature in several local and international public collections, such as the prestigious Collection of the MNAM, Musée National d'Art Moderne - Centre Georges Pompidou (France), the Collection of Frac-Île de France (France), the Museum of the Louvre Abu-Dhabi (United Arab Emirates) and the Collection of the Fondation Kadist (France / United-States).

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Night Dive, 2021

Spray paint on canvas 
135 x 236 cm / 53 x 93 in.

Represented by Almine Rech

Andrea Marie Breiling, born in Phoenix, Arizona, is an American contemporary abstract painter, whose works are primarily constructed using spray paint on canvas, a brush-free approach to painting. Allowing her to render large, kinetic, pieces of work. Exhibiting fluid, atmospheric, energy that exemplifies the physicality behind her creative process.

Breiling received her BFA in Studio Art and Gender Studies from UC Irvine in 2008 and her MFA in Studio Art from Claremont Graduate University in 2014. In April 2021, Breiling presented her first solo exhibition with Almine Rech “I Think I Might Have Inhaled You” in Brussels, Belgium, and her second Solo show “Sweet Dreams of Rhythm and Dancing” with Almine in London, United Kingdom. She’s also featured works at Broadway Gallery, New York, Night Gallery, Los Angeles, Achenbach Hagemeier, Düsseldorf, Denmark,; Galleri Urbane, Dallas, TX; Sonce Alexander Gallery, Los Angeles, CA; and Peggy Phelps Gallery, Claremont, CA. Breiling has also participated in several group exhibitions, including but not limited to Rachel Uffner, New York, New York, Collaborations, Copenhagen, Denmark, Jack Siebert & Caio, Los Angeles, California, Van Doren Waxter, New York, New York, Library Street Collective, Detroit, MI; Various Small Fires, Seoul, KR; The Mass, Tokyo, JP; Carl Kostyál Gallery, Stockholm, SE; SUNNY NY, New York, NY; Blum & Poe, Los Angeles, CA; Achenbach Hagemeier, Berlin, Wilding Cran Gallery, Los Angeles, CA; Night Gallery, Los Angeles, CA; and Skibum MacArthur, Los Angeles, CA. Andrea’s newest solo exhibition “Fence, Fall, Touch,” is set to debut at Almine Rech in Beijing, China later this month. Andrea and her work has been featured multiple times on Artsy’s “10 In demand works on Artsy This Week”, Art And Antiques Magazine, Let's Make Lots of Monet, GQ Style, Whitewall, Artforum, LA Weekly, The Nation, The Hollywood Reporter, Abstract, Cultured Magazine, the Los Angeles Times, Larry’s List, and LALA Magazine, among others.

Andrea Marie Breiling currently lives and works in the New York metropolitan area. Her work is represented in collections at the ICA Institute of Contemporary Art Miami, Deji Art Museum, Xuanwu District, Nanjing, China, X Museum, Beijing, China

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