Claude Cortinovis
February 23 - April 28, 2018
Press release in French
Press release in English
Installation views
Gowen Contemporary is delighted to present for the rst time at the gallery a solo show by Swiss artist Claude Cortinovis. The exhibition brings together a selection of his photographs and works on paper from the last fteen years, describing his artistic practice, his rituals, his relationship to time and reality, his questioning of imagery and writing.
His subjects start with photographic images of mostly female portraits, self-portraits or landscapes. His images are expanded and veiled by either the color or the text, each one giving itself to be discovered and distinguished through the appropriate distance necessary to their understanding. Up close, the disconcerting pixellated grid is revealed; from afar, the appeasing shape of the body appears.
The viewing distance is essential in the work of Claude Cortinovis and so is the capture of time, of extended time, which is synonymous with patience. This long-term work, scienti cally ordered, comes with the sweet taste of instants, which the artist will seek in the re ned details of the image, meticulously and slowly built up of tiny square elements.
The artist manually criss-crosses his paper with thousands of small squares, rigorously lled with different colors, using ink-coated stamps. The gestures are repeated and the work follows mathematical patterns prede ned by the artist. The details emerge as a trace of an irreversible time and offer the artist a very orderly and precise hiding place. This self-imposed meticulous repetition, this constant discipline, allow him to transcend into timelessness the painful reality of an actual experience.
In the recent series, Nameless (2013-2017), Claude Cortinovis represents new compositions of anonymous female portraits in frontal views. These portraits of women, accidentally found in photo booths, present fragmented faces, as if the passing of time had erased their identity. Degradation weakens the image and makes it ephemeral. The more the sign disappears, the more it is in harmony with the desire to appeal to the resurrection of absence.
Claude Cortinovis was born in 1967 in Geneva where he lives and works. He graduated from the Ecole Supérieure d’Art Visuel de Genève in 1991 in «Graphic expression» with Carmen Perrin, followed by a training in «Mixed Media» in the studio of Sylvie Defraoui. Selected solo shows since 1993: Keitelman Gallery, Brussels, BE (2014, 2008, 2002); ONE contemporary art gallery, Verbier, CH (2011); Galerie Gisèle Linder, Basel, CH (2007); Galerie Mitterrand+Cramer, Geneva, CH (2004); Centre de la photographie, Geneva, CH (1997); Nouvelle Galerie, Grenoble, FR (1997); Palais de l’Athénée, Salle Crosnier, Geneva (1993).
Selected group shows since 1990: CACY • Centre d’art Contemporain Yverdon-les-Bains, traveling to Château de Vuillerens, Vuillerens, CH (2017); Espace des Télégraphes, Lausanne, CH (2015); Pavillon Sicli, Geneva, CH (2013); Villa Empain - Boghossian Foundation, Brussels, BE (2011); FLUXmUSeum, Pagosa Srpings Colorado, USA (2010); RNG Gallery, Omaha Nebraska, USA (2010); Galerie Gisèle Linder, Basel (2009); Hall-Palermo à la Kunsthalle Palazzo, Liestal, Basel, CH (2001); Espace Arlaud, Lausanne, CH (1998); Centre de la photographie, Bienne, CH (1998); Collection du FCDAV au Palais Wilson, Geneva, CH (1998); 5th international photography triennal in Tampere, Nykyaika, Tampere, FIN (1998); Galerie Rosa Turetsky, Geneva, CH (1996); Palais de l’Athénée, Salle Crosnier, Geneva (1990).