The artwork features a black-and-white photographic image of two individuals in an intimate embrace, with a minimalist line-drawing of two heads facing each other below. The composition emphasizes the intertwining, gestural forms of the figures, and the stark contrast between the photographic and graphic elements creates a visually striking juxtaposition. The style and technique suggest a conceptual exploration of human connection and relationships, while the simple line drawing adds an abstract, symbolic layer to the work. The historical context or the artist's intention behind this piece likely explores themes of intimacy, vulnerability, and the complexity of human interactions. ...
Rafik Greiss is an Irish-born Egyptian artist who moves between sculpture, moving-image, collage, and photography. With a keen eye for movement and vulnerability, Greiss uses the camera to preserve ephemeral points of contact, capturing sublime vistas from a moving train, footprints in the snow, or moments of intimacy between clubbers and lovers. Texture and surface are key components the artist plays with, producing glossy inkjets on Japanese paper alongside aluminium steel surfaces or structures in the gallery space. These installations evoke simultaneous feelings of dislocation and communion, as his figures are physically separated from these urban signifiers, whilst the frame provides a sense of kinship for his subjects. Drawing from a broad range of influences such as Greek mythology, fashion photography and landscape painting, there’s a distinct poetic sensibility to Greiss’s work. Cinematic in tone, traces of Andreas Gursky, Thomas Struth and Wolfgang Tillmans can be found in his portfolio. ...
Balice Hertling was founded in 2007 by Daniele Balice and Alexander Hertling. Balice Hertling has hosted the debut solo shows of many artists like Camille Blatrix, Xinyi Cheng and Isabelle Cornaro—all of whom have gone on to earn widespread recognition. From 2012 to 2016, gallery founders Daniele Balice and Alexander Hertling operated a project space in Manhattan. Returning to France in 2017, they relocated the main gallery to Paris’ Marais district and transformed the former Belleville location into a space for curated projects and shows by younger artists. Indeed, many artists represented by the gallery exemplify unique subcommunities of the emergent art world. This breadth of representation also translates to a breadth of medium, as the gallery represents painters as well as artists working in mixed media such as film, performance and sculptural objects. The gallery also represents artists whose careers are more established : British conceptual artist Stephen Willats, Syrian-born painter and sculptor Simone Fattal, and Italian artist Enzo Cucchi. In its programming and practices, Balice Hertling constantly works toward creating a more diverse and equitable art landscape. In this spirit, the gallery is proud to represent the Estate of Behjat Sadr, who was the first woman artist to be recognized as a modern master in Iran. As a result of the pandemic, the gallery co-founded « Palai » in the summer of 2021, a yearly exhibition hosting a small group of galleries from around the world, in historic locations in Lecce, a city in Italy's Puglia region. Palai is neither a curated exhibition nor a fair, it is thought to be a version of a residency, a collegial collaboration, where artists, galleries, and friends of the art world come together. In 2021 Balice Hertling relocated and brought closer both spaces in the Marais with a new main space inaugurated by a Ser Serpas scultpure solo show, and a new showroom and project space on rue de Montmorency. ...
