For this year’s edition of Art Brussels, Zina Gallery is pleased to present a project that unites new series of works in painting and ceramics by artists Charles de Bisthoven and Lorena Cocioni.

Their works hover away from a world where ’’cyber-consumers-citizens, plugged in and plugged away, all consumed and consuming’’[1] are left to process their realities. The mutual resonance of their works pivots on dismissing realism while maintaining a close tie to contemporary issues, through dreamlike renderings of art history imagery, pop culture motifs or transdisciplinary gender research, but most noticeably on their common visceral visualities. 

The booth is a catalyst for two mediums, painting and ceramics, in which related motifs such as bodily structures and cavities, ruins and traces, neon signs and tissues, appear as intricate mechanisms that unveil subversive gestures in the present. Cocioni’s sculptures – gleaming, thin, and self-protective engage in a compelling conversation with Charles’s abundant and energetic paintings, maintaining a balance between abstraction and familiarity, speed and slowness.

The soft, pale colors in the paintings create a contemplative atmosphere that harmonizes with the metallic and pink glossiness of the ceramic installations.

In Bisthoven’s paintings, glowing creatures evolve within consumerism, being pulled in by the volumes, outlines and structures of superabundant, muddy and ever-expanding landscapes. Scattered in the space, Cocioni’s sculptures, both featuring wearable body parts, are responsive to the environment, offering protection, and, moreover, occupying the space through guidance.

Text by Daniela Custrin

[1] Sarah Sharma, In the Meantime: Temporality and Cultural Politics (Duke, 2014), p. 3.