Some Watercolors - Amelie von Wulffen

Some Watercolors, by Amelie von Wulffen / 20 pages, 7.7 x 10 inches, saddle-stitched, published in 2023 by Nieves (Switzerland) / ISBN 9783907179628

***

In this small volume, normally-inanimate objects are brought to life by Amelie von Wulffen's paint brush, moving throughout this strange, surreal universe as if they were real people. The result is a series of darkly funny paintings that shed light on our own mundane realities.

Since the 1990s, von Wulffen has created a sophisticated and unique oeuvre that enquires into the historic, economic, and social conditions of painting. Highly self-reflexive, von Wulffen’s practice expands to include the artist herself. She frequently appears in her own work in different guises, interweaving her family’s past with national history and existential questions about a specifically German cultural heritage. Von Wulffen’s works purposefully juxtapose aesthetic incongruities and combine different styles of painting from art history and amateur art to re-purpose their associative weight. In that respect, her work reads as a meta-reflection on the aesthetic incongruities of both post-war Germany as well as contemporary popular and political culture. This effect is compounded by the inclusion of references to decorative arts, furniture and architectural elements.

Von Wulffen has shown at major institutions such as Centre Pompidou, Paris; Kunstmuseum Basel, Basel; KW Institute for Contemporary Art, Berlin; Studio Voltaire, London; La Biennale di Venezia, Venice; Manifesta, Donostia-San Sebastian; and Aspen Art Museum, Colorado. Her work is held in the private collections of prestigious institutions such as Pinakothek der Moderne, Munich; Centre Pompidou, Paris; Musée National d’Art Moderne, Paris; the Hammer Museum, Los Angeles; the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; and the Museum of Modern Art, New York.