Hans Bellmer: Vintage Prints
Marvelli Gallery, New York
February 13 - March 22, 2003
Marvelli Gallery presents an exhibition of vintage prints by German artist Hans Bellmer (1902-1975). Continuing the exploration of the influence of Bellmer's photographs on contemporary art - begun with the show Negative Spaces and further investigated in Desiring Machines curated by Marcello Marvelli and Helaine Posner at Dorsky Gallery, Marvelli Gallery now exhibits a rare group of vintage prints from the years 1934-1949.
Traditionally associated with surrealism, Hans Bellmer is emerging as one of the 20th Century's most influential artists. Bellmer's photographs of dolls are eccentric masterpieces of emotional intensity and formal sophistication that provide a clear precedent for Cindy Sherman, Francesca Woodman and for a generation of younger photographers such as Anna Gaskell and Annika Von Hausswolff, among many.
Hans Bellmer's work is very complex not only in its layers of meaning and possible psychoanalytic interpretations, but also in its emotional intensity, achieved by expressionistic lighting and unusual framing that create a morbid and suspended atmosphere. Feelings of desire are projected onto the body of the doll in a way that remains controversial and disturbing today. the doll also evokes emotions of entrapment, loneliness, loss and sexual desire as well as vulnerability and nostalgia, and triggers unexpected emotions of empathy in the viewer.
Hans Bellmer's photographs have recently been exhibited at a retrospective held at the International Center of Photography in New York and at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in the exhibition Surrealism: Desire Unbound.
MARVELLI GALLERY
526 West 26th Street, New York, NY 10001
www.marvelligallery.com
