LA AIR by Paulette Penje

from 9 June to 25 September 2022

The video and performance artist Paulette Penje (born in 1984 in Berlin) works with color and movement. She questions painting, space and the in-between through and with her body.

For the exhibition LA AIR she spits paint on the wall and tries to lick up the paint with her tongue before it reaches the floor. In the end, spit figures remain on the wall as well as video pieces about the process of creation.

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Plakat LA AIR Paulette Penje - Stadtgalerie Saarbrücken

Who sets rules for an artistic work? What demands do we make towards art? Is an archive only relevant through processes of its completeness? How important are the creating paintings, their leftovers and the tools used?

Does an artist necessarily have to be on site in order to develop an authentic work with the space? What happens when a previous concept torpedoes itself? The artist has previously worked on her performance I wish I was a Dancer in public spaces, for example the Williamsburg Bridge in New York (2017). At the Stadtgalerie, she is building herself a tool, which in itself is a work and which completely overturns a previous rule.

In her first institutional solo exhibition, Paulette Penje questions her own actions and art as a whole.

Photos by Joas Strecker