Tomi Ungerer — Overdose — Galerie G-P & N Vallois — Exhibition — Slash Paris

Past: April 18 → May 25, 2019

“First of all, it should be noted that Ungerer is free.

Free to borrow different ways and voices according to his moods, anxieties and the urgency of the moment. Sometimes the author of simple or baroque collages, sometimes of sculptures and assemblages depending on the cases, crazy, hilarious, dreary, morbid and disturbing — in the sense of « unheimlich » of the term -, Ungerer can also don the costume of a cartoonist respectful of the beautiful craft firm or fine line. Nothing, nobody, can enclose him in a box.

Because if he is free, it is primarily his unclassifiable dimension that characterizes him. Ungerer has gone through the history of contemporary art, the stories dare to say, without ever seeking to position himself and even less to stand out.”

Erik Verhagen

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Without boundaries, without shame, without restrictions, Tomi Ungerer has never limited himself to a single medium nor a single mode of expression. He was always ready to tackle everything!

At the age of 25, leaving for the new world: $ 60 in his pocket, New York, a stateless among many others… Free, funny and cheeky, Tomi Ungerer seduces the press, magazines, The New York Times, Esquire, Life, Fortune. The drawings of the young French are “trend”! Three robbers, the moon man, and we forget the never-ending orgasms, the sex à l’américaine, and the fucking machines. Nearly 4000 drawings, sculptures, posters, collages… Tomi Ungerer wavers between the world of children and the adult realm to which the gallery dedicates its next exhibition: a series of inexhaustible shock images marked by a dark, discordant, provocative humor that is his. From Xeroxes to ink and Barbie dolls, the artist never stops imagining, distorting, and confusing. the gallery opens its doors to humor, color, sex, and EXCESS!

Agate Bortolussi