Feeling Purple

Feeling Purple

29 April – 7 May 2022
Retramp Gallery
Reuterstraße 61, Berlin

Drawings, objects and scenographic laboratory by Marta Colombo, Curated by Valentina Galossi & Katia Hermann

Aphrodite, 9 drawings, Mixed media on paper, 18 x 24 cm, 2020

The exhibition “Feeling Purple” features works on paper from the “Aphrodite” series, as well as a site-specific intervention, conceived for Retramp Gallery during Berlin Gallery Weekend, and some “Souvenirs” / “Spatial Strategies”.

“Aphrodite” is a series of small works on paper, which focus on the figure of the Greek goddess of beauty and love: Venus, in Roman mythology, or Aphrodite in Greek mythology. What is associated with beauty and love? How is beauty represented in different cultures, and how were beauty and love represented in antiquity? What attributes would one associate with a contemporary Venus? With these questions as a starting impulse, the “Aphrodite” series emerged; refined visual and poetic thoughts on paper. The purple fabric, mysterious, soft and with a furry surface, is the element that characterizes the entire series of collages. This elegant fabric is the attribute chosen by the artist for her contemporary Venus. The purple fabric does not remain only an element to be observed in Marta Colombo’s drawings, but is also reflectively placed in the gallery, to make it interact with the real space.

This material, particularly inspirational, becomes part of the installation in situ created specifically for Retramp, and at the end of the exhibition is made available to the public, in the context of a “Scenographic Laboratory” conducted by the artist to which the public is warmly invited to participate during the Finissage of 7 May at 6pm.