F or the majority of her career, Lassnig was largely underrepresented as an artist – her unnerving self-portraits made curators nervous. But her work was extremely personal, and her belief that painting should be experienced firsthand led her to explore the principle of ‘Body Consciousness’ which inspired the Austrian artist’s practice from the late 1940s onwards.
Painting only the parts of her body that she could feel in the moment, her self-portraits explore relationships with sensation and sentiment. The abstracted forms and highly-charged hues combine to reform our perception of the human as a being.
This substantial retrospective will feature more than 200 artworks, including not only the celebrated “Körperbewusstseinsbilder” - ‘Body-Consciousness’ paintings - but also drawings, sculptures, film work, and even pieces which have never before been shown publicly.
Maria Lassnig: Ways of Being will be on view at the Stedelijk Museum through 11 August.
