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until 09.11. | #4381ARTatBerlin | ChertLüdde shows from 07. September 2024 two solo exhibitions by the artists Selma Selman and Piero Gilardi.
On the occasion of Berlin Art Week 2024, ChertLüdde will open the solo exhibitions of Selma Selman and Piero Gilardi on Friday, September 7, 2024, both of whom are exhibiting at ChertLüdde for the first time. On Friday, September 13 (Gallery Night of Berlin Art Week), Selma Selman will perform “Letters to Omer” and the gallery will be open until 10 pm.
Selma Selman: Ophelia’s Awakening
On the occasion of Berlin Art Week, ChertLüdde is pleased to present Selma Selman’s first exhibition at the gallery titled Ophelia’s Awakening. Transforming the gallery into a scrapyard of discarded cars and appliances, Selman reimagines Hamlet’s Ophelia as a self-emancipated figure using herself as the painted subject. Car doors, washing machine fronts, a bathtub and hoods from old Mercedes vehicles litter the gallery as repurposed canvases, which have been painted with self-portraits and poems from the artist’s ongoing series, ‘Letters to Omer’.
“DEAR OMER / WOMEN LIKE ME CRY A RIVER / DRINK IT, AND THEN BUILD A BOAT / IN WHICH THEY MAKE PLANS / TO BE BORN AGAIN” is read on one of the car hoods. On another work, the artist depicts herself gazing beyond an absent figure that holds her close—a single, bloody tear bisects the composition. These scrap metal paintings subvert conventional femininity and fragility associated with Ophelia, transforming pain and trauma into powerful symbols of resilience and strength. Unlike the passive portrayals by William Shakespeare or John Everett Millais, the artist’s Ophelia is defiant and self-determined. Selman’s reinterpretation is of a woman who awakens to reclaim her agency and rewrite her own narrative.
The actor in her own video work Crossing the Blue Bridge (2024), Selman shows herself escaping from danger. She retraces her mother’s steps during the Bosnian War, on the day of a cease fire when she shielded her child from the sight of the corpses that laying on the bridge. Through integration of self-portraiture and biographical elements, the exhibition adopts a cross-sectional approach, distancing the figure of Ophelia from traditionally Eurocentric origins.
The gallery is also perfumed with the pungent scent of gasoline, an artwork titled The Most Dangerous Woman (2024), which was also featured in the artist’s recent solo exhibition Flowers of Life at the Schirn Kunsthalle Frankfurt (on view until the 15th of September, 2024). This provocative aroma, combined with the scrap metal pieces, deepens Selman’s exploration of identity and heritage. Her family’s work in scrapyards reflects the economic crisis in Bosnia-Herzegovina and the global forces that impact Roma communities. By using waste materials in her art, she gives value to things that would otherwise be discarded, and challenges perceptions of the labor her family does for a living.
On Friday, September 13th at 8 pm, Selma Selman will also be performing a poetic reading of Letters to Omer in which she addresses her intimate feelings and desires to a fictional character named Omer.
Selma Selman, Ophelia’s Awakening, 2024, oil on Mercedes car doors, 130 × 88 × 25 cm (51 ⅛ × 34 ⅝ × 9 ⅞ in.), 130 × 100 × 30 cm (51 ⅛ × 39 ⅜ × 11 ¾ in.), photo by Marjorie Brunet Plaza, courtesy of the artist and ChertLüdde, Berlin
BIOGRAPHY
Selma Selman (b. 1991, Bihać, Bosnia and Herzegovina) graduated in 2014 from the Department of Painting at the Academy of Arts in Banja Luka, and defended her MA at Syracuse University, New York State in 2018 in the field of Transmedia – visual and performing arts. She was also a resident of Rijksakademie from 2021 to 2023.
Her works embody the struggles of her own life as well as her community, and employs a variety of media such as performance, painting, photography and video installations. Selman defines herself as an artist of Roma origins, not a Romani artist, a subtle yet critical distinction in the work. Her pieces are often inspired by her personal history, her family’s lifestyle and the background she comes from, exploring issues of child marriage, women’s role in Roma communities and education. Selman’s aim is to break down the prejudice which keeps pushing down her community to the lowest common denominator, denying its right to self-expression. She utilizes her personal background as a lens through which she can understand the universal human condition and its idiosyncrasies. Selma is the founder of the organization Get The Heck To School whose aim is to encourage and empower Roma girls around the world facing poverty and social exclusion.
Her work is currently exhibited at Hamburger Bahnhof – Nationalgalerie der Gegenwart, Berlin and Schirn Kunsthalle, Frankfurt. She has also participated in exhibitions at: Autostrada Biennale, Prizren (2023), documenta 15, Kassel (2022), Manifesta 14, Prishtina (2022), Kunstraum Innsbruck (2022), MO Museum, Vilnius (2022), Ludwig Museum, Budapest (2022), Kasseler Kunstverein, Kassel (2021), National Gallery of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Sarajevo (2021), acb Galéria, Budapest (2021), Queens Museum, New York (2019) and Maxim Gorki Theater, Berlin (2017).
Piero Gilardi: Foam Rubber Revolution
Piero Gilardi (1942–2023, Turin, Italy) was a renowned Italian artist and activist, celebrated for his innovative and experimental approach to art, particularly through his creation of Tappeti-Natura (Nature Carpets). These soft sculptural works, crafted from hand-carved and painted polyurethane foam, vividly mimicked natural environments such as riverbanks, seasides, forests, caves, vegetable gardens, and flowers. Gilardi’s artistic journey began in the early 1960s, coinciding with the emergence of Arte Povera in Turin. He played a crucial role in this movement, not only as a creator but also as a theorist, critic, and curator of social initiatives, serving as a key reference point for other artists.
For Berlin Art Week 2024, ChertLüdde presents Foam Rubber Revolution, a significant homage to Gilardi, curated by Marco Scotini and organized in collaboration with the Fondazione Centro Studi Piero Gilardi in Turin and Galleria Giraldi in Livorno. The exhibition will showcase a selection of Tappeti-Natura from the 1960s, displayed across the gallery’s walls and floors to become an immersive and hyper-realistic landscape, frozen in an artificial yet soft and inviting medium. These works were originally designed not merely for visual appreciation but for interaction. Viewers could lie, play and engage with them, offering spaces conceived as beds, alcoves, and foam playgrounds to welcome the body.
The exhibition aims to capture the essence of Gilardi’s belief in art as a tool for social change and environmental awareness. It reflects his lifelong dedication to pushing the boundaries of art, emphasizing the interconnectedness of nature, technology, and human experience. Alongside the sculptures, archival materials will provide further context, highlighting his ecological activism, political beliefs, and commitment to social justice.
As Gilardi once remarked, “Art educates by conveying knowledge, but also emotions through empathetic communication.” By evoking proximity to nature through synthetic materials, he embraced a techno-utopian vision that revolutionized public perceptions of both art and the environment. This exhibition stands as a testament to Gilardi’s enduring legacy, demonstrating how his work continues to inspire and challenge the ways we perceive and interact with both art and the natural world.
Piero Gilardi next to the installation “PHOSPHORE”, 2008 at MAXXI – National Museum of 21st Century Art, “Nature Forever”, 2017, photo by Musacchio and Ianniello, courtesy of ChertLüdde, Berlin and Fondazione Centro Studi Piero Gilardi, Turin
BIOGRAPHIES
Piero Gilardi (1942-2023, Turin) created his first pieces in polyurethane foam in 1965, a medium that he would later exhibit internationally in cities like Paris, Brussels, Cologne, Hamburg, Amsterdam and New York. From 1968, he stopped producing regular art works to pursue his interest in materials connected to the technological advancements of the time and engage in the new artistic trends like Arte Povera, Land Art and Antiform Art of the late ‘60s. This led him to participate in the first two international exhibitions of the new trends at the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam and at the Bern Kunsthalle.
As a political activist and facilitator of youth culture, he organized several experiences of collective creativity across Africa, South America and Reservations in the USA. In 1981, he resumed his activity in the art world and exhibited installations, accompanied by creative public workshops. By 1985, he started an artistic research project with new technologies through the IXIANA PROJECT (later presented at the Parc de la Villette in Paris). This work consisted of a technological park in which the public could artistically experiment with digital technologies. In 1993, he set up a “virtual” hall based on his decades of research at the 45th Biennial in Venice and more recently produced a number of multi-medial interactive installations and participated intensively in international shows like the ARTEC Biennial of Nagoya, ARTIFICES 3 Paris and MULTIMEDIALE 4 Karlsruhe. For many years, he presided over the international association “Art Technica” which promotes two Artlab exhibitions of neo-technological art in Turin. He has published two books of theoretical reflection about his varied forms of research: Dall’arte alla vita, dalla vita all’arte (From art to life, from life to art), La Salamandra, Milano 1981 and Not for Sale, Mazzotta, Milano 2000 and Les Presses du reel, Dijon 2003. He also wrote articles for a number of different art magazines such as Juliet and Flash Art.
Marco Scotini is the head of the Visual Arts and Curatorial Studies Department at NABA (Milan-Rome), Artistic Director of the FM Center for Contemporary Art and Head of Exhibitions Program at Parco d’Arte Vivente (PAV) in Turin. He has curated the Albanian Pavilion at the Venice Biennale (2015), three editions of Prague Biennale, Anren Biennale (2017), the Second Yinchuan Biennale (2018) and collaborated on two editions of the Bangkok Biennale (2020, 2022). His project, Disobedience Archive, has been traveling for 20 years through international museums and recently it was invited to the 17th Istanbul Biennale, Timisoara Architecture Biennial and 60th Venice Biennale.
Vernissage: Saturday, 7. September 2024, 6 – 9 pm
Performance “Letters to Omer”: Freitag, 13 September 2024, 8 pm
Exhibition period: Saturday, 7. September until Saturday, 9. November 2024
To the Gallery
Bildunterschrift Titel: Selma Selman, Ophelia’s Awakening, 2024, oil on Mercedes hood, 146 × 146 × 20 cm (57 ½ × 57 ½ × 7 ⅞ inches), photograph by Marjorie Brunet Plaza, courtesy of the artist and ChertLüdde, Berlin
Exhibition Selma Selman, Piero Gilardi – ChertLüdde | Zeitgenössische Kunst in Berlin | Contemporary Art | Exhibitions Berlin Galleries | ART at Berlin
