Caroline Bourgeois – författare

Mehretu’s evocative compositions in conversation with artists and writers of all stripes, imparting the artist’s ongoing commitment to collaboration

This catalog is published in conjunction with a major exhibition dedicated to the work of American artist Julie Mehretu (born 1970), spotlighting more than 60 paintings, drawings and prints, from the past 25 years—several of which were painted in the last two. Her sensual and emotional compositions are imbued with palimpsestic and inventive marks that emerge from a dense, multilayered and complex set of references: art historical and sociopolitical, geographical, contemporary and personal. Mehretu’s practice has also always engaged in various forms of collaboration and sustained conversation with fellow artists.Fittingly, then, this catalog presents Mehretu’s work alongside that of the artists and writers Nairy Baghramian, Huma Bhabha, Robin Coste Lewis, Tacita Dean, David Hammons, Paul Pfeiffer and Jessica Rankin.

By carving stone monuments in the shape of unassuming objects, Trouvé’s "memory art" enshrines the ordinary past

Moving between a prehuman past, a turbulent present and a speculative future, Tatiana Trouvé (born 1968) draws the viewer into disorienting spatial, mental and temporal worlds. Her "memory art" repurposes stone, marble and other materials and transforms them into quotidian sculptures; tombstones turn into books and veined slabs of marble become briefcases. Meanwhile, her pencil drawings on bleach-spattered canvases turn the photorealistic image into part of an abstract dreamscape. Objects and images migrate from two dimensions to three and back again, appearing and reappearing in a range of different spaces and scenarios. This latest monograph on her practice spotlights several new sculptures and installations, alongside a group of recent large-scale drawings.