Ronchini Gallery is proud to present the first UK solo exhibition of new works by French artist Elvire Bonduelle.
This exhibition features a series of works following on from her curatorial project Waiting Room, which focuses on the experience of contemplation and a critique of how we interact with art in typical gallery spaces.
Developed because she viewed waiting rooms as the perfect setting for the contemplation of art, Bonduelle recreates the gallery space as her own waiting room – with a twist. When talking about the way that the viewer interacts with art she states “everything is here: quite often we don’t see anything...”. Through the exploration into mundane spaces, her fascination of architecture, space and geometry allows her to create a hopeful revitalisation of our concentration; testing the viewer by literally ‘rotating paintings.’ As the name suggests, the playful nature of the works comes through as they can be seen from each different angle, in many different orders. Bonduelle’s early drawings of spaces are turned into a 3D reality with black metal benches and ‘soft books’. The spectator navigates their way around the soft and minimal forms that clash against the black metal. Taking inspiration from observations of our daily and immediate environments, her multiplied ‘brush stroke’ paintings discuss the commodification of art, the ready made and our ability to consume and disregard art, without a second thought. Her minimalist, abstract style references art history and celebrates form and colour.
Elvire Bonduelle was born in 1981 in Paris. She studied at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts de Paris in Richard Deacon' studio and graduated in 2005. Mainly based in Paris, her works have been exhibited in France and abroad. Selected solo exhibitions include: Osmos Gallery, New York, NY (2016); Galerie Van Gelder, Amsterdam (2015); Galerie Laurent Mueller, Paris (2015); Galerie Sabrina Amrani, Madrid (2011) and Centre Culturel Français, Lomé, Togo (2009). Selected group exhibitions include: New Archive at LACA, Los Angeles Contemporary Archive, Los Angeles, CA (2014); To the Moon via the Beach, conceived by Philippe Parreno and Liam Gillick, and curated by Tom Eccles, Liam Gillick, Hans Ulrich Obrist, Philippe Parreno and Beatrix Ruf, the Amphitheatre, Arles, France (2012).