If the pastose application of paint, the grimacing faces and the injured surfaces by Ellen Gronemeyer remind you of Asger Jorn or Karel Appel you are not entirely off base. Gronemeyer celebrates painting as if there was no yesterday – most recently as a participant of the group exhibition Painting Forever! in Berlin.
The Ludwig Forum Aachen will house the young artist’s first museum based solo-exhibition.
Often applying gloomy shades and grotesque shapes, Gronemeyer expressively formulates portraits of catlike artists, headless suits or pointy-nosed ladies. At first sight her pictures seem to con firm all that the viewer knows about figurative painting since the 1950s. On closer observation however, one starts to doubt these presumptions: Quotations from a pictorial comic language comment the chapped surface in a mean yet smug way, restraining the pure action through aloof interventions and hereby question ing an all too one-sided perception. The work titles often deal with the change between boisterous painting and intellectual comment. A match that lends depth and contemporaneity to Gronemeyer’s paintings – even though they stubbornly oppose the Zeitgeist.
Together with the Ludwig Forum the artist will select around 30 of her works for the presentation.
Curators: Dr. Brigitte Franzen, Josephine Mengedoht
Ellen Gronemeyer (*1979) studied i.a. under Daniel Richter at the HfBK Hamburg. She lives and works in Berlin.
Ellen Gronemeyer – Watchever, Installation Views
Photos: Carl Brunn / Ludwig Forum Aachen
