Special Show - leading and emerging women artists

In the post-war era, societal shifts made it possible for larger numbers of women to work professionally as artists, yet their work was often dismissed in the male dominated art world. However, the second half of the 20th century progressively gained the necessary openness to allow talents to flourish. After her emigration to the United States in 1938, Louise Bourgeois was first represented in Europe by Karsten Greve, with whom she had a close bond for over the entire 30 years of their collaboration. In her oeuvre, Louise Bourgeois gives a specific form to that which cannot be adequately put into words, allowing the outside world to feel her from the inside-out. Throughout her career, Louise Bourgeois experimented with various materials for her sculptures. For her totems, she worked with wood, fabric, bronze, and plaster and latex in the 1960s. Her marble works are a tribute to the baroque sculpture of the 17th century and particularly to the Italian sculptor Gian Lorenzo Bernini. Baroque (1970), exhibited at her first retrospective at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in 1982, can be interpreted as a metamorphosis and contemporary readaptation of the famous sculpture Apollo and Daphne. Exhibited alongside are works on paper – which she called her “pensées-plumes” (feather-thoughts, to enhance their volatility) – such as the portfolio The view from the bottom of the well (1996).

Through their lens, Lynn Davis and Sally Mann reveal metaphorical landscapes – Davis’ Greenland adventures depicting the majestic icebergs from the early 2000s, and Mann’s Deep South series focusing on the American South, from the dreamy Faulkner’s novels to the hidden history of war and violence laying underneath. Dorothea Lange’s Migrant Mother, Nipomo, California (1936) is one of the most iconic photographs of all time. In 1936, Lange encountered the mother of 32 years old at a pea-picking camp in California during the Great Depression – her vision of the mother depicts a Madonna of the modern age, her face marred with worries and misery, children clinging to her frame. Ilse Bing’s years in Paris inspired her to capture the essence of the zeitgeist with a bold frameworks and innovative approach– from the nightlife effervescence of dance and theatre, to nocturnal cityscapes Fountain. Place De La Concorde (1933).

Luise Unger’s sculptures of crocheted steel wire are both architectonic and anthropomorphic, the silhouettes emerging give an illusion of black shadows, the hollow spaces gathering light in their centre. Maria Nepomuceno, relying on ancient weaving techniques, borrows from the artisanal traditions of her native Brazil to create abstract forms out of rope, the organic forms sneaking on the ground like jungle vines. Craftsmanship in the work of these artists is a way to hold time in their hands.

Reunited together, the exhibited works offer original perspectives, initiating unexpected dialogues and generating fresh appreciation for each work included in the exhibition.