The Victresses
This series of seven paintings questions famous motives from art history, in which women or the „woman“ is depicted with attributes originally not inherent to her, like those of victory and symbols of triumph or freedom. In this aspect the „woman“ in Vermeers allegoric painting „The art of painting“ acts as Clio, the muse of history. Simultaniously she serves her role in the bigger allegorical connections of the tableau, which nearly leads to the total negation of her as an individual being.
Other motives, the artist deals with are the sculptural „Joan of Arc“ from the Place du Parvis in Reims, depicted with her sword stretched to the sky, and the top of the victory column in Berlin, where „Victoria“, the goddess of triumph, presents the laurel wreath in her rigth while holding a „Trooping the colour“ with the iron cross in her left. Next up is Delacroix´s famous work „Liberty is leading the people“, in which the bare breasted „Marianne“ figures as a chiffre forthe ideals of the french revolution: liberty, equality, brotherhood.
The motives of the sowjetic memorial „Worker and Kolkhoz woman“ by Vera Mukhina and the „Goddess of Liberty“ statue improvised by art students during 1989 demonstrations on the Tiananmen square. This statue created from plaster and polystirene took „Statue of Liberty“ as model and was destroyed, when the uprising was ended by force. The final painting in the series up to today deals with one of the most iconic templates for the genre „victory goddess“ in genral, the famous „Nike of Samothrake“.
The Victresses were first shown as a series of than four paintings on the academy circuit in the Weissensee University of the arts Berlin in 2007/8. Since that time three additional works of the series were created.
Translation Philipp Koch
exhibition view 2008, Berlin, University of Arts
exhibition view 2008, Berlin, University of Arts