SAATCHI GALLERY
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SELECTED WORKS BY Marlene Dumas



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Marlene Dumas

Young Boys

1993
Oil on Canvas

100 x 300cm

In Young Boys, Marlene Dumas's line-up of ghostly lads is stark and oppressed against the ominous background, trailing off in the distance into mere sketchy traces of suggestion. It's this suggestion that Dumas does best: a void of colour, a bleeding line, she creates a subtle, unnerving, perversity from an unabashed simplicity. This is painting with no frills: full on, with nowhere to hide.


Marlene Dumas

The Cover Up

1994
Oil on Canvas

198 x 99cm

In The Cover-Up, Marlene Dumas presents a corruption of innocence. Her portrayal of a young child with its clothes lifted over its head immediately gives way to dark thoughts of sexuality and exploitation. The controversy isn't in the images Marlene Dumas paints, but in the way they're subverted by an implied knowingness, a blatant confrontation with a natural reality and its discomforts.


Marlene Dumas

Jule-die Vrou

1985

125 x 105cm

Jule-die Vrou is a disembodied portrait painting framed in extreme close-up; only the model's eyes and lips are fully rendered attributes of seduction and sexuality. The rest of the painting is obliterated by a corpulent fleshy pink, suggestive of femininity, sin, violence and womanhood. The contrast between representation, and abstraction suggests a psychological disparity, where morality, representation, and social convention are questioned.

‘I don't have any conception of how big an average head is, I've never been interested in anatomy. In that respect I relate like children do. What is experienced as most important is seen as the biggest, irrespective of actual or factual size. In the movies everything is larger than life and yet you experience that as real(istic); all my faces are much bigger than human scale. From blowing up to zooming in, for me the “close-up” was a way of getting rid of irrelevant background information and by making the facial elements so big, it increased the sense of abstraction concerning the picture frame. The elimination of the background also did away with the place of being and environmental context.'

‘As the isolation of a recognisable figure increases and the narrative character decreases (contrary to what one might initially assume that this lack of illustrative information would bring about), the interpretative effects are inflamed. The titles re-direct the work, however, they do not eradicate the inherent ambiguity. One cannot interpret the painting of Jule-die Vrou without entangling some of the root metaphors applied not only to the female, but to the idea of portrayal in general'. Marlene Dumas, 1992.


Marlene Dumas

Die Baba

1985
Oil on Canvas on Linen

130 x 110cm

Bathed in sickly blue-yellow light, Marlene Dumas's baby is almost repellent. Instead of an instant love affair, Dumas paints an alien encounter, the unnerving presence of an ‘other', the realisation of an individual with a will and determination of his own. Marlene Dumas confronts the reality of motherhood, with all its natural and terrifying implications.


Marlene Dumas

Feather Stola

2000

100 x 56cm

In Feather Stola, Dumas recalls the painterly gestures of expressionism, while combining the critical distance of conceptual art with the pleasures of eroticism. The relationship between art and female beauty - or between art-historical models and twentieth-century supermodels - are constant themes in her work.



ARTIST INFORMATION




Marlene Dumas's BIOGRAPHY






1953
Born in Cape Town, South Africa

1972-1975
BA Fine Art, University of Cape Town

1976-1978
Atelier 63, Haarlem, Netherlands

1979-1980
Institute of Psychology, University of Amsterdam


SELECTED SOLO EXHIBITIONS


2004
The Second Coming Frith Street
Gallery, London
Con vista al celestiale Montevergini, Sicily
(In search of) the Perfect Lover Hauser & Wirth, London
Termite Art v White Elephant Fundacio ICO, Madrid

2003
Suspect Fondazione Bevilacqua la Massa,
Venice

2002
Name No Names New Museum, New York

2001
Name No Names Centre Georges Pompidou,
Paris

2000
Strippinggirls Theatermuseum, Amsterdam
Marlene Dumas Camden Arts Centre, London
All is Fair in Love and War Jack Tilton/Anna Kustera Gallery,
New York

1999
M D-light Frith Street Gallery, London

1998
Miss World Galerie Paul Andriesse, Amsterdam
Fantasma Fundao Gulbenkian, Lisbon
Damenwahl Kasseler Kunstverein, Kassel

1997
Young Boys - Part II Gallery Koyanagi,
Tokyo
Marlene Dumas: Wolkenkieker Produzentengalerie Hamburg

1996
Models NGBK/Haus am Kleistpark, Berlin
Marlene Dumas Tate Gallery, London
Pin Up Stedelijk Museum, Tienen

1995
The Dutch Pavilion Venice Biennale
Models Kunstverein, Salzburg; Portikus, Frankfurt

1994
Chlorosis Douglas Hyde Gallery, Dublin
Marlene Dumas The Arts Club of Chicago, Chicago
Not From Here Jack Tilton Gallery, New York

1993
Give 'em what they Want Zeno X Gallery,
Antwerp
Land of Milk and Honey Produzentengalerie, Hamburg
Marlene Dumas ICA, Philadelphia

1992
Ask me no Questions and I'll tell you no Lies
Galerie Isabella Kacprzak, Cologne
Insight Axe-No-7, Quebec
Strips In Situ/Ardi Poels, Maastricht
Miss Interpreted Stedelijk Van Abbemuseum, Eindhoven

1991
The Origin of the Species Galerie Paul
Andriesse, Amsterdam
Ausser Reichweite von Kindern Galerie Stampa, Basel

1990
Couples Museum Overholland, Amsterdam
The Origin of the Species Staatsgalerie Moderner Kunst, Munich

1989
The Question of Human Pink Kunsthalle,
Bern

1988
Nightmares Galerie Wanda Reiff, Maastricht
Mother Explains Life to Her Son Kunstcentrum Marktzeventien,
Enschede
Waiting (for meaning) Galerie Paul Andriesse, Amsterdam
Ecco Pier Paolo Pasolini Filmmuseum, Amsterdam

1987
The Private versus the Public Galerie Paul
Andriesse, Amsterdam

1986
Fear of Babies De Expeditie, Amsterdam

1985
The Eyes of the Night Creatures Galerie
Paul Andriesse, Amsterdam

1984
The Artist as a Young Girl Galerie Flatland,
Utrecht

1983
Unsatisfied Desire Galerie Paul Andriesse,
Amsterdam

1980
Marlene Dumas Galerie Lambelet, Basel

1979
Marlene Dumas Galerie Annemarie de Kruyff,
Paris

 
 

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