Dorothea Tanning’s Exhibition at Tate Modern

De Laszlo scholar Nneka Uzoigwe gave an amazing lecture a couple of years ago on one of her favourite artists Dorothea Tanning, who has an upcoming exhibition at Tate Modern at the beginning of next year.

In Nneka’s own words:

I am very excited to see that Dorothea Tanning will be exhibiting at the Tate Modern next year, from the 27 February – 9 June 2019. This will be a wonderful and rare opportunity to see all her work together side-by-side, depicting her early paintings right through to her more abstract works and sculptures. I first came across her work in 2015 when I walked in on her exhibition ‘Web of Dreams’ held by the Alison Jacques Gallery and had an instant affinity emotionally and creatively. It struck a cord from my childhood, as I had loved the idea of painting dreamlike scenarios but hadn’t come across an artist who had expressed her imagination quite like this. Ever since I’ve been mesmerised by her work, collecting her books and researching into her life. So it is now a celebration to finally see an artist such as Dorothea, whose work is so powerful, unique and full of emotional charge and vision, being given its due diligence and centre stage.

….Now the doors are all open, the air is mother-of-pearl, and you know the way to tame a tiger. It will
not elude you today for you have grabbed a brush, you have dipped it almost at random, so high is
your rage, into the amalgam of color, formless on a docile palette.
As you drag lines like ropes across one brink of reality after another, annihilating the world you made
yesterday and hated today, a new world heaves into sight. Again the event progresses without benefit
of hours.
The application of color to a support, something to talk about when it's all over, now holds you in
thrall. The act is your accomplice. So are the tools, beakers, bottles, knives, glues, solubles, insolubles,
tubes, plasters, cans; there is no end. . . .

One of my favourite works of hers I’m hoping to see are, ‘Portrait de Famille’, a painting of fluxing tangled bodies, celestially ascending into the sky: which I’ve always thought would look rather lovely on the ceiling of the Sistine chapel. Another is her eerie installation, ‘Poppy Hotel Room 202’, part of a series of her soft sculptures, which erupted from her imagination while listening to the composer, Karlheintz Stockhausen, conducting his piece ‘Hymnen’. Very worth a listen.