Feeling of Light
Apr 19 — May 27, 2023 | Brussels
Almine Rech Brussels is pleased to announce the group show 'Feeling of light'. Featuring works by: Shuvinai Ashoona, Farah Atassi, Charlotte Beaudry, Ana Benaroya, Jenny Brosinski, Myrlande Constant, Corydon Cowansage, Genieve Figgis, Sylvie Fleury, Miryam Haddad, Aly Helyer, Alicja Kwade, Minjung Kim, Marie Laurencin, Inès Longevial, Cécile Maulini, Selma Parlour, Mary Ramsden, Hiba Schahbaz, Vivian Springford, Emma Stern, Claire Tabouret, Tursic & Mille, Garance Vallée, Jess Valice, Amanda Wall, Yvonne Wells, Janet Werner, Dawn Williams Boyd, Hu Zi
The most famous myth about the birth of painting is probably the one told by Pliny the Elder in his Natural History c. 75 AD: the story of Dibutade’s daughter, the young woman who drew the outline of her lover’s shadow in charcoal on the wall of her house before he left for a long journey, capturing his silhouette to give his presence the illusion of eternity. This woman, whose first name Pliny omits to mention, was the first painter in history. Kora of Sicyon—her actual name—created painting as an antidote to absence and disappearance, and invented an art whose necessity has been continually affirmed ever since.
It is to this woman that we owe the invention of representation, the form we give to the impossibility of forgetting. Kora of Sicyon thus made it possible to offer an ultimate attention, a final light to an image before it disappears, this famous “feeling of light” of which the poet and painter Etel Adnan speaks. All the artists, historical and contemporary, gathered and invited by Almine Rech for this exhibition have a shared dedication to that particular light produced by a work of art.