Review
Marlene Dumas. open-end
March 27, 2022 – January 8, 2023
Palazzo Grassi, Venice
Like Ghosts. Dissolving, liquid. [Omega’s Eyes, 2018]
The paint is washed away, like waves, like wind. [Smoke, 2018; Intoxication, 2018]
So bold, so fragile. Like goddesses, like embryos. Who are these women? So cold, so cool.
[Painting is] Like Drugs. So dirty, so good. So subtle, so strong. Femininely violent/violently feminine.
Ice[d] kiss. [Octopusses]. Reference to Arnulf Rainer.
Sexualized subjects. [No] Phantasies. Nature, humans and animals.
A rose, a butt. A dove, a gutt.
A youth, a horse; a kiss, a boar.
Fuck. Me gentle. [But dark]
Photo: Marco Cappelletti with Filippo Rossi © Palazzo Grassi © Marlene Dumas
A bright bride. A dark slave. [Ghosts]
The Origin of the World. A mermaid, and her leviathan friend. The paint washes away, it flows.
Baselitz, but not upside down.
Colour, smoke, suffocation.
These are Icons.
Like cursed dolls; blue, red, orange eyes. Such a dirty view [sguardo]. Take her from the back. And the frog frontwise.
Dissolution. The feet, the bodies.
Good painting makes you want more. [And text, too.]
Open-end[ed].
[…] Ser Serpas presents paintings and four installations at Kunsthalle Basel. It is her largest institutional exhibition in Switzerland up to date. There is pain, audio and visual. Naked bodies in positions of suffering or dissolution. […]