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until 18.10. | #4392ARTatBerlin | DUVE BERLIN shows from 06. September 2024 the exhibition When it gets Dark by the artist Alicia Echandía.
Slowly, dusk falls over unknown, uncharted landscapes. The sunlight is fading and darkness is approaching. Is it still day, or has night come? The moon appears, but its light does not seem to touch the leaves and branches – they glow as if illuminated from within. Despite the approaching evening, the colours remain vibrant in their full intensity. A hand reaches into the scene and a sharp knife slices through the rind of a lemon. A bird-like creature slumbers beneath dense foliage, while elsewhere a bull gazes sideways into the frame with its head slightly lowered. Shiny, patterned fabrics envelop entire rooms. But what is really happening? Is this dream or reality? In a strange liminal state, different impressions and scenarios merge, intertwining clear and vague motifs in a single space. The unfamiliar comes together in a wondrous way. One moment a visual anchor seems to offer stability, the next this trace dissolves into a chaotic tangle. Surreal worlds emerge, hovering between the known and the unknown, the possible and the absurd, dream and reality.
Alicia Echandía’s compositions defy any temporal boundaries – they have neither a clear beginning nor a definitive end. With her enigmatic visual language, the artist creates imaginary spaces on the threshold between reality and fantasy. Her works capture wondrous moments inspired by the mythical and literary narratives of Magical Realism, a genre particularly popular in Latin America. The starting point for her paintings are collected and original photographs, as well as paper collages, which are altered and fused into new visual worlds on canvas, always allowing for a wide range of additional associations. She combines elements from the flora and fauna with impressions from everyday life. In her works, Echandía not only combines different visual fragments, but also incorporates cultural influences, including her own Colombian heritage, which manifests itself in the form of masks, fabric patterns and costumes. In this way, she creates images within images that can be endlessly retold and transformed into an unknown and surprising face. The fantastic meets the real, blur and precision coexist. The works open up seemingly endless realms of imagination and thought, where the boundaries between dream and reality are blurred. Each painting becomes an invitation to dive into a world unlike anything we’ve seen before.
Text: Carolin Kralapp
Biography
Alicia Echandía (*1999 in Bonn, Germany) is studying Fine Arts at the Kunstakademie Düsseldorf in the class of Ellen Gallagher. She has already exhibited at BBK Kunstforum, Galerie Bengelsträter, Akademie Galerie in Düsseldorf and Palmer_Galerienhaus in Stuttgart. In addition to her solo exhibition at DUVE Berlin, Echandía will also be represented at the 78th Internationale Bergische Kunstausstellung at the Kunstmuseum Solingen in September 2024.
Opening : Friday, 6. September 2024, 6 – 9 pm
Exhibition period: Friday, 6. September until Friday, 18. October 2024
To the Gallery
Title image: ALICIA ECHANDÍA *En llamas/ In Flammen*, 2024, 100cm x 70cm, Oil on canvas, Courtesy the artist and DUVE Berlin
Exhibition Alicia Echandía – DUVE BERLIN | Zeitgenössische Kunst in Berlin | Contemporary Art | Exhibitions Berlin Galleries | ART at Berlin
