Major exhibition of Maria Lassnig's work opens in Ljubljana
Ljubljana, 28 February - An exhibition of Maria Lassnig's paintings and drawings has opened in Ljubljana's Cankarjev Dom in what is the first independent exhibition of the acclaimed Austrian artist in Slovenia. Lassnig (1919-2014) is most famous for her expressive self-portraits.
Ljubljana
Cankarjev Dom, the country's leading arts and convention centre.
Photo: Tamino Petelinšek/STA
File photo
One of the most prominent figures of the European art scene in the past century, Lassnig is also known for her concept of "body awareness".
In addition to her drawing and painting she was also a filmmaker. Worldwide fame came to her relatively late, when she turned 70.
The exhibition features 78 drawings, four oil paintings and two videos. The organisers decided to focus on her drawings because they bear great significance in her oeuvre, Peter Pakesch, the exhibition's co-curator and Maria Lassnig Foundation director, told a press conference on Tuesday.
Art historian Claire Hoffmann says in a text accompanying the exhibition that not only there are many drawings in her oeuvre, but they are also a way for her to face the core problems in the pursuit of an artist's identity and the relationship to one's body.
The exhibition is designed to take visitors on a journey through Lassnig's life, chronologically tracing important places and milestones in her life and the works of art that were created during these periods, said Katarine Hergouth, the exhibition's co-curator and exhibition program manager at Cankarjev Dom.
Lassnig was born in Austria's Carinthia in 1919 and studied painting at the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna during WWII. After graduating, she returned to Klagenfurt, where her studio became a meeting place for artists and writers. Her work was rooted in expressionism and surrealism.
In the 1950s she discovered art informel in Paris and joined the Dog Pack group of artists that was influenced by abstract expressionism and action painting. She was a part of several artistic circles, and broke free from stylistic constraints while living in Paris in the 1960s.
Later she lived in New York, where she studied animated film and made short films. In 1980, she returned home to lecture at the Vienna University of Applied Arts, becoming the first female professor of painting in a German-speaking country.
She was also the first female artist to win the Grand Austrian State Prize in 1988. She was honoured with the Golden Lion Award for lifetime achievement at the Venice Biennale in 2013.
Organised in cooperation with the Maria Lassnig Foundation, the Neue Galerie in Graz and the sixpackfilm platform and with the support of the Austrian Cultural Forum Ljubljana, the exhibition will run until 18 August.