This vibrant artwork features a close-up portrait of a woman with her eyes closed, lost in contemplation as she holds a yellow flower close to her face. The composition is dominated by bold, contrasting colors - the deep black of the woman's hair and the vivid pink background. The artist's skillful use of oil painting techniques creates a striking, almost photorealistic rendering of the subject's facial features and expression. This work likely reflects the artist's intention to explore themes of sensuality, introspection, and the power of simple, everyday experiences to evoke profound emotional responses. ...
As quotidian as her paintings on paper appear, there is an unavoidable and intrinsic power to Mercier’s works. Her very personal works sensitively explore political, feminist, mental health, and empowerment issues. She questions the norms of representation through the prism of the female gaze, the re-appropriation of nudity, and the transition of the female body from the status of object to that of subject. Her works aestheticize daily life with a vernacular emphasis on the political, all imbued with the joy of sorority, power, and feminine anger. ...
Ballon Rouge began as a nomadic gallery in September of 2017. In our first two years we put up exhibitions in Istanbul, London, Los Angeles, Brussels, Sao Paulo, Paris, and New York. Each of the cities we visited was stewarded by a ‘collective member’ - a curator who introduced us to artists and to their respective city’s art scene. In March of 2019 we made Brussels our home city, inaugurating our permanent space. While we will continue to do shows abroad alongside our collective members, our primary location is now Brussels. Besides our own exhibitions, the space in Brussels sometimes hosts invited international galleries to show with us in exchange for a show of ours at theirs - a further continuation of our ethos of collaboration and collectivity. So far we have collaborated or will soon collaborate with Hannah Barry Gallery (London); Melange (Cologne); Galerist (Istanbul); Gallery Artbeat, (Tbilisi); the Pill (Istanbul); Pi Artworks (Istanbul, London); Vitrine (London, Basel). ...
