Two exhibitions
dal 22/2/2007 al 30/3/2007
Segnalato da
22/2/2007
Two exhibitions
Hosfelt Gallery, New York
Driss Ouadahi / Jutta Haeckel
Driss Ouadahi
Unexpected Neighborhoods
In his first solo New York exhibition, Algerian Driss
Ouadahi paints lush, gridded abstractions that refer-
ence architecture found on the outskirts of urban
Europe. Cities like Paris and Berlin built huge high-rise
housing developments on their peripheries to accom-
modate growing immigrant populations. Without
revealing the inhabitants, the paintings nonetheless
bring to mind the politics of class, religion and ethnicity
embodied within these structures.
Drawing upon a lifelong interest in architecture,
Ouadahi creates a hybrid language of structural design
and abstract painting that infuses rich color and light
into the rigid form of monotonous buildings. Broad,
multi-colored brushstrokes define volume and depth in
the paintings’ repetitive geometry. The lushness of
paint creates a seductive but impenetrable surface,
leaving us wondering about the life behind the walls.
---
Jutta Haeckel
Shadows and Tattoos
A leisurely nostalgia pervades the work of German
painter Jutta Haeckel. Fenced-in parks and yards, a
house tucked into a forest, skeletons of roller coaster
s peeking over lush trees, colors a little too bright and
shiny. Wistfulness makes room for a stranger mood,
not quite ominous, not quite reassuring.
Haeckel is interested in the psychological space that is
formed by the contradictions of shrinking borders due
to globalization. Drawing upon her own travels, she
references thousands of her own photographs to
“filter” the lines that are blurred between nature/
artifice and original/copy. Both gorgeous and unsettl-
ing, Haeckel’s locales force the questions of time and
place while benignly suspending recognition.
Image: Jutta Haeckel, Die dunkle Seite des Mondes (The Dark Side of the Moon), 2006 oil on canvas 63 x 79 inches
Hosfelt Gallery
531 W 36th Street - New York
Hours: Tuesday - Saturday 10-6