"GEMINI" SARAH FAUX: Brussels
Past exhibition
Press release
Geminis are known for their volatile temperaments. When I tell someone my sign, I get mixed reactions. Those who adore arguing or gossiping enjoy Gemini chattiness; others think of the twins as two-faced. While I’m not a devout believer in astrology, I have always identified with the idea that a single person contains multiple selves. Far from being willfully deceptive, Geminis personify innate human conflicts. A parent who raised you with every good intention might also pass on all their most oppressive habits. Your fondest memory of sun pouring through the window as you sip coffee with a lover could transform into a cavernous source of pain postbreakup. How we experience single moments in time can oscillate wildly physically and emotionally. Or maybe that’s just the Gemini in me.
This show is full of pairs. “Torn at the shoulder” and “Into her inner” are mirrored reflections of each other. In one a woman looks back at her own naked body through scraps of fabric. In the other, her image is overwhelmed by a deep green field of desire. I could not have made one piece without the other, could not have depicted calm without anxiety or openness without impediments.
In a looser pairing, “Dig me in” and “Dig me out” derive their compositions from twisted aloe stalks winding through the surface of each canvas. Both are meditations on painting itself: a tongue lapping up gnarly gray to reveal intense ultramarine behind it; hairy legs shooting through pink gaps, leaving smears of umber in their wake. Like doppelgangers, the twins in this show harken back to each other in ways both familiar and strange, providing one another with company while eerily unsettling any static notions of sensory life.
Installation Views
