Maggi Hambling + Sarah Lucas | OOO LA LA | Contemporary Fine ,Arts (CFA Berlin) | 13.03.-25.04.2026 (Jasdeep)

until 25.04. | #4982ARTatBerlin | Contemporary Fine Arts presents from Friday, March 13, 2026 the exhibition “OOO LA LA” by the artists Maggi Hambling and Sarah Lucas.

Hambling and Lucas met 25 years ago, on October 23, 2000, their shared birthday, at the Colony Room Club in Soho. Since then, they have shared a friendship characterized by admiration and trust. They laugh together often. As neighbors in rural Suffolk, they anchor their connection in everyday life and nurture it through conversation. This long-standing closeness is the focus of the exhibition and demonstrates how two distinct artistic approaches can engage in dialogue.

OOO LA LA explores the commonalities in their approaches, particularly their sensitivity to the interplay of sexuality and death. These themes stem from shared lived experience and are addressed with openness and courage. The exhibition is not the result of a collaborative studio process. The works were created in parallel, and the connection only becomes apparent when they are seen together. “What’s extraordinary is that during the exhibition, it feels as if we are working at opposite ends of the same studio,” the artists explain. This feeling is taken seriously in the exhibition. Painting and sculpture are closely intertwined, sometimes in clearly defined pairs, sometimes in open constellations, creating echoes through material, rhythm, and tone.

Lucas’s work is closely linked to Contemporary Fine Arts; the collaboration began in the mid-1990s. Her oeuvre, encompassing sculpture, photography, and installation, is known for its sharp wit and the transformation of found objects into expressive figures. The body in its diverse forms remains her central theme. In “Blue Bunny” (2025), an anthropomorphic figure reclines on a chair, adding a touch of surrealism to Lucas’s distinctive visual language. Gender-specific materials such as high heels and nylon stockings become elements that appear bold and exposed, confident and delicate at the same time.

Hambling brings painting to the exhibition as an expression of intimacy and encounter. As a pioneering artist and queer icon, she repeatedly returns to love and memory, often through portraiture. For Hambling, painting is a physical partnership with the medium itself. She says, “Oil paint is something very alive, something sensual. I have to fall in love with it.” In OOO LA LA, this sensual materiality becomes a means of capturing time, attention, and affection.

Portraiture is a central theme of the exhibition. On display are works that both artists created of each other, each in their own distinct style. They describe portraiture as an intense, immersive act that holds the thrill of risk and the promise of success. During their collaboration, Hambling realized that she had truly experienced Lucas at work for the first time. She then created “Sarah at Work” (2025), in which she attempted to capture Lucas’s energy and focus. A second portrait, “Sarah Laughing” (2025), celebrates the freedom of expression and the joy of uninhibited presence.

Smoking, another shared habit, becomes an unexpected link between sculpture and painting. Lucas portrays Hambling with this in mind in “Maggiesque” (2025), a figure with a cigarette, and in a new portrait titled “Maggi the Three Wise Men” (2026), composed of cigarettes on brown paper. The gesture is affectionate and precise, transforming an everyday ritual into an image and an image into a trace.

“OOO LA LA” is, at its core, an exhibition that brings things back to life. The exhibition understands practice as a repertoire that must be kept alive, enriched through experimentation, and renewed through friendships. The result is a show that feels present, full of warmth, wit, and the joy of the two artists’ public reunion.

OOO LA LA continues a presentation originally developed in London with Sadie Coles HQ and Frankie Rossi Art Projects, now taking place in Berlin in a new form with recent works and a configuration specifically designed for the gallery space.

Maggi Hambling was born in Sudbury in 1945, and Sarah Lucas in Holloway, London, in 1962. Both live and work in London and Suffolk.

Vernissage: Friday, 13. January 2026, 18 – 20 Uhr

Caption: Maggi Hambling and Sarah Lucas, courtesy of CFA Berlin, Photo: Julian Simmons