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until 18.04. | #4412ARTatBerlin | carlier gebauer shows from Saturday, 14. March 2026 the exhibition The Weight of Light by the artist Jessica Rankin.
Carlier | Gebauer, Berlin, is pleased to announce the solo exhibition The Weight of Light by New York-based painter Jessica Rankin, featuring seven new works.
Rankin is known for her distinctive use of thread and paint on canvas. In her work, she deliberately forgoes the mastery of a single medium in favor of an intuitive, playful approach in which paint behaves like thread and thread like paint. Moving between disciplines, Rankin creates a visual interplay between color and line, as well as between painting and writing. Having received neither formal training as a painter nor as a textile artist, and thus rejecting mastery as a form of control, she gains a particular freedom within her creative process. Reflection on the work is either embedded in its making or occurs retrospectively. Rankin herself describes her process as “making in a state of apprehension.”
Her compositions extend beyond the edges of the canvas, onto which she sews fragments of text. These references fold over the sides, inviting viewers to step closer and move around the work, positioning themselves in relation to it. The textual fragments Rankin employs, as well as the titles of her large-scale paintings, often quote poems from her personal canon, unraveling a network of deeply intimate and personal references. At the same time, they raise questions about artistic production and art history—about genealogies and visibility—filtered through the lens of poetry and unfolded across the canvas. Rankin considers herself a “sincere artist,” approaching her work not with ironic distance but with a certain degree of skepticism.
With poet Ada Limón, whose poem “Fifteen Balls of Feathers” Rankin cites in the paintings Watery Extension of Time (AL) and Small Susurrations (AL), she shares an exploration of enthusiasm and passion for human existence in everyday life. Like the rippling of water or powerful rays of sunlight that imprint themselves on the retina, these concentric compositions convey a sense of wonder at the diversity of human experience and the natural environment.
In her work, Limón addresses themes such as inheritance and transmission, which Rankin develops in different ways throughout the exhibition. Loop up the Sky Swooping (JR) references “Mainland Eyes,” a poem by the artist’s mother, Jennifer Rankin, herself an acclaimed poet. Writing in 2026, Martin Duwell described the poem as creating the impression of a scene in which people engage in ordinary, seemingly unremarkable activities, while the poet’s true interest lies in the sky and its inhabitants—birds. In this sense, “Mainland Eyes” introduces Rankin’s enduring concerns.
In Her Gathered Beams (M), Rankin draws on a fragment from John Milton’s Paradise Lost, conceived as the first biblical epic in the English language, centered on elevated themes such as love and heroism. Rather than constructing a heroic narrative, however, Rankin introduces a radiant heroine who gathers rather than conquers—an approach that can be understood in light of Ursula K. Le Guin’s Carrier Bag Theory of Fiction. Finally, in Whistle Anciently (AN), drawing from Alice Notley’s poem “For the Ride,” Rankin reflects on the solitary conditions of artistic creation. The linen canvas is filled with ribbon-like forms that flow alongside one another but rarely intertwine or overlap.
Jessica Rankin (b. 1971 in Sydney) lives and works in New York. Selected solo and two-person exhibitions include White Cube, Hong Kong (2024); Touchstones Rochdale, United Kingdom (2017); Museum Dhondt-Dhaenens, Deurle, Belgium (2016) with Julie Mehretu; Salon 94, New York (2014); Savannah College of Art and Design, Atlanta (2013); The Project, New York (2009); MoMA PS1, New York (2006); and Franklin Artworks, Minneapolis (2005).
Group exhibitions include Palazzo Grassi, Venice (2024); the Uptown Triennial, New York (2017); Whitworth Art Gallery, Manchester (2015); Kunstmuseum Wolfsburg (2013); Fie Myles, New York (2011); Jenkins Johnson Gallery, San Francisco (2011); The Studio Museum in Harlem, New York (2006); The Project, Los Angeles (2005); and Artist’s Space, New York (2003).
Opening: Saturday, 14. March, 2026, 4 pm – 9 pm
Exhibition dates: Saturday, 14. March until Saturday, 18. April 2026
To the Gallery
Image Caption: Jessica Rankin, The Weight of Ligh, exhibition view at carlier | gebauer, Berlin, 2026 Photo © Andrea Rossetti
Exhibition Jessica Rankin – carlier | gebauer | Zeitgenössische Kunst in Berlin | Contemporary Art | Ausstellungen Berlin Galerien | ART at Berlin
