Janaina Tschäpe — Until I come — Xippas Gallery — Exhibition — Slash Paris

Past: October 22 → November 18, 2015

The Xippas Gallery is pleased to present the third solo show of Janaina Tschäpe, the German — Brazilian artist living in New York.

Janaina Tschäpe conceived these dreamlike landscapes — loosely inspired by South American fauna and flora — which progressively grow into true ecosystems where life develops and blossoms in vibrant and intermittent light. Oscillating between abstraction and figurative representation, the artist enables these various systems to coexist simultaneously, amplifying and distilling the spectator’s reference points and defying the laws of gravity. She creates a floating universe where terrestrial beings mingle with aquatic and divine ones, creating her own distinct and personal mythology.

Janaina Tschäpe, Endless Summer, 2015 Mixed media on canvas — 160 × 160 cm Courtesy of the artist & Galerie Xippas, Paris

In her new exhibition, Until I Come, the artist explores links between eroticism and art. The creative process transforms into a constant quest for climax: the exact instance when the artwork reaches its culmination. The artist translates the intensity of this process as an explosion of colors and energies. The mediums of drawing and painting, which are usually considered distinct, here coexist, interlace, and ultimately fuse with the canvas.

Janaina Tschäpe, Into Deep, 2015 Mixed media on canvas — 160 × 160 cm Courtesy of the artist & Galerie Xippas, Paris

The exhibition was conceived as a fragmented narrative. The titles of the paintings, loosely inspired by her summer memories, lend themselves to several possible readings all the while impregnating the spectator with a sensual ambiance. A series of drawings enriches this broken narrative. This group of drawings, enigmatic like a personal diary, encourages us to daydream. The final stage of this journey is the video installation Somersault that provides an immersive experience. Surrounded by image and sound, the spectators dive into an aquatic universe dear to Janaina Tschäpe, lose their landmarks, and are carried away.

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Janaina Tschäpe was born in 1973 in Munich, Germany. She lives and works in New York and Rio de Janeiro.

Her work has already been showed at the Centre Pompidou, the Irish Museum of Modern Art, the Museum of Contemporary Art in Tucson, and the Nichido Contemporary Art in Tokyo. Her works are part of many prestigious collections, including the collections at the Centre Pompidou, the Fonds National d’Art Contemporain, the Moderna Museet (Stockholm), the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum (New York) and the Museo National Reina Sofia (Madrid).