Marres, Centre for Contemporary Culture in Maastricht Opens “Madame Realism”

MAASTRICHT.- As part of the program on the Avantgarde, Marres presents Madame Realism, a group exhibition where the interior once again takes a central place. Madame Realism presents works of exclusively female artists in the historical and domestic rooms of Marres. The presentation refers to both the private domain of the interior and the public space of an exhibition. In Madame Realism, several themes will be addressed: the female dandy, visible and invisible gender roles, the political implications of design and reflections on the interior as a form of social critique.

With the exhibition À l’intérieur in 2006, Marres introduced the position of the Dandy in relation to the 19th-century desire for beauty as a new metaphysics. Stylemeister San Ming transformed the rooms of Marres into a private domain in which every form of hierarchy, for example between art and design, was dissolved in favour of an individual universe. Madame Realism aspires to provide the commonly male position of the dandy—this idiosyncratic ‘home curator’—with a counterpart, by way of focusing on the work of female artists inspired by the interior. However, in Madame Realism, the interior is approached as a reflection of the outside world.

The works exhibited in Madame Realism do not aim to improve the house or its domesticity, but instead want to radically change the idea of home. The works in the exhibition are inspired by (designs for) the interior, made for the interior, can be associated with the ‘inner life’ or are otherwise challenging to be seen in the context of the interior. In Madame Realism, the interior is approached—physically, artistically, literary or mentally—as a domain of emancipation and dissidence.

The exhibition includes works of: Eva Berendes, Ruth Buchanan, Bonnie Camplin, Melissa Gordon, Pernille Kapper Williams, Annette Kelm, Kitty Kraus, Janette Laverrière, Linder, Hanne Lippard, Michaela Meise, Josephine Pryde, Lili Reynaud-Dewar, Clare Stephenson, Lina Viste Grønli, Jessica Warboys and Amelie von Wulffen.

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