» New York – Anne Imhof: “Avatar” at Galerie Buchholz Through July 2nd, 2022



Anna Imhof, Avatar (Installation View), all images by Aleph Molinari for Art Observed)

Continuing her experimentation with spatial arrangement and irreverent institutional takeovers, Anne Imhof has transformed the uptown gallery space of Galerie Buchholz for her new exhibition, Avatar. A simulacra of an institution of learning, the exhibition plunges the viewer into an alternate universe that embodies the industrialized cut-and-paste production of knowledge and identity. It is both an avatar for these spaces of socialization, as well as the avatars people adopt while navigating  them. Presenting physical signifiers in opposition to surreal juxtapositions of other works, the show explores space’s role in the production of power, sites of cultural socialization, and its interrelations to social constructs. 

Anne Imhof - Avatar 01
Anna Imhof, Avatar (Installation View)

Anne Imhof - Avatar 02
Anna Imhof, Avatar (Installation View)

Rows of gray metal lockers run along the entirety of the gallery’s walls, with lockers protruding into the space to create a labyrinthine effect. Labyrinths are a familiar motif in Imhof’s work: for her Natures Mortes show in Paris last year, she partitioned the cavernous downstairs gallery of the Palais de Tokyo with tall glass plinths to create a disorienting effect, a city built within a museum. For Avatar, Imhof placed a single cinder block into each of the lockers–a metaphor for the weight of our past selves, of past teenage personas. Hanging behind and on the lockers are her industrial-grade lacquer paintings from the Gradient and Scratch series, amplifying the sense of  angst and the desperate desire to claw out of one’s skin.

The effect of the exhibition is one of stepping into a time capsule and unlocking forgotten memories of youth. At the opening, the atmosphere was akin to a high school, with people clustered in small groups—this being a wholly Imhofian school, dark and minimalist, where broody misfits and weirdos are the stars of the show. Much in the same way that the artist’s Venice show explored the gaze in its relation to space and bodies, here she allows the attendees to once step into the foreground.

Avatar is on view from May 19th until July 2, 2022

Anne Imhof - Avatar 07
Anna Imhof, Avatar (Installation View)

–A. Vrubel

Read more:
Anne Imhof: Avatar [Exhibition View]

on Monday, June 13th, 2022 at 12:00 pm and is filed under Art News, Featured Post, Show.
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