calendario eventi  :: 

X

22/11/2007

Zwischenbilanz II

Baloise Art Forum, Basel

The exhibition "Zwischenbilanz II" at the Baloise Art Forum showed new acquisitions at the Baloise Group Art Collection from November 23, 2007 until May 16, 2008.

Since the late 1980s, the Baloise's art-buying policy has focused on drawings and photography – two media that are of crucial importance to contemporary art. The Baloise is thus assembling a collection of international contemporary art that now comprises some 800 works by more than 70 artists. In winter 2002/03, the Baloise Art Forum presented the exhibition "Zwischenbilanz".

Now, the company's art commission is staging a second retrospective exhibition reviewing its buying policy: "Zwischenbilanz II". Some of the key new acquisitions made by the commission in the last five years are featured. The artists presented in this exhibition are not, however, a representative cross-section of recent purchases – the selection made for "Zwischenbilanz II" focuses exclusively on artists whose chosen medium is drawing. Photography is not included. Furthermore, "Zwischenbilanz II" excludes those artists for whom Baloise has staged individual exhibitions in the last few years. So Silvia Bächli (2003), Monica Studer/Christoph van den Berg (2005), Thomas Huber (2005/06), Stephen Waddell (2006), Aleksandra Mir (2006/07) and Peter Piller (2007) are not featured, as the Baloise has assembled sizeable collections of their works in recent years.

"Zwischenbilanz II" provides snapshots of significant works of contemporary drawing: Annelise Coste keeps a kind of diary on A4 sheets, with acerbic comments on modern society, while Mrzyk & Moriceau use fantasy and comedy to give us insights into suppressed and absurd aspects of our daily life.

The essence of the strongly autobiographical works of both Zilla Leutenegger and Keren Cytter is shaped by what the artists experience, see, and dream. Simone Shubuck depicts a colorful, false-bottomed, kaleidoscopic world of figures and forms with numerous allusions to Jugendstil ornaments and to the hippy culture of the late 1960s. The works of Claudia & Julia Müller and Slawomir Elsner confront us with the intangible and other-worldly that can be inherent in familiar (media) pictures. And finally, Lucy Skaer meticulously draws rooms on large-format sheets in which memories of real architectural fragments are condensed into dreamlike structures.

Martin Schwander

Image: Keren Cytter, Blue Aquarium, 2007


Annelise Coste (b.1973 Marseille, France; lives in Zurich)
Keren Cytter (b.1977 Tel Aviv, Israel; lives in Berlin)
Slawomir Elsner (b.1976 Wodzislaw, Poland; lives in Berlin)
Zilla Leutenegger (b.1968 Zürich; lives in Zurich)
Petra Mrzyk & Jean-François Moriceau (live in Châtillon, Indre, France)
Claudia & Julia Müller (b.1964 & 1965 Basel; live in Basel)
Simone Shubuck (b.1969 Fort Monmouth, New Jersey, USA; lives in New York, NY)
Lucy Skaer (b.1975 Cambridge, England; lives in Glasgow, Scotland and Basel)

Bâloise-Holding
Aeschengraben 21
4002 Basel Switzerland
The exhibition will be open to the public Mondays to Fridays, 8 am to 6 pm. Background information on the artists and work will be available.

stampa

permanent link