The Polish-German artist Alicja Kwade, whose intricately conceived sculptures of natural materials play with perceptions of time and scale, has joined the roster of Pace Gallery.
“I am incredibly excited to join Marc Glimcher and his exceptional team,” said the Berlin-based artist. “I believe this new chapter will facilitate the growth of my artistic practice, opening up immense possibilities, enabling me to pursue even the most ambitious visions.”
Pace will represent Kwade together with her existing galleries, Mennour, 303 Gallery, and i8 Gallery. Until recently, Kwade was represented by König Galerie, which collaborated with Pace to organize a 30-work exhibition by the artist in Seoul in 2021.
“Alicja is an artist who reveals the unknowable,” said Marc Glimcher, CEO of Pace Gallery. “In her practice, Alicja transforms our sense of perception and draws attention to nature’s relationship to human existence. There is deep affinity with our program in the philosophical and spiritual nature of Kwade’s work.”
Alicja Kwade Trait Transference (2015) © Alicja Kwade. Photo: Roman März
Kwade’s work often brings together materials and forms into unlikely assemblies that edge on the phantasmagoric. In Mono Monde (2023), a white lawn chair that at first appears to be plastic is actually made of bronze, allowing it to support a large blue orb made from azul macaubas without folding in on itself. In a recent large-scale exhibition at Lehmbruck Museum, in Duisburg, Germany, titled “In Agnosia,” other sculptures seem to hold such material contradictions—a delicate mobile sculpture hangs suspended overhead, bearing large stones.
In 2024, Kwade will have a show at Museum Voorlinden in the Netherlands. She will also present work at Pace’s booth at Paris+ (opening to VIPs today, October 18) in a group presentation that sees artists respond to Mark Rothko, who is subject of a large survey at Bourse de Commerce in Paris. In this context, Kwade is presenting Trait Transference—the time-wrought mixed-material sculpture, consisting of mirror and steel. Its rusted surface recalls Rothko’s celebrated abstract color field paintings while extrapolating on it, bringing into the fold the consideration states of transformation in the physical realm.
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