Sunsetter
Marlon Wobst
27.01 > 12.03.2022 - EN
Presentation
Variations of pinks of a silhouette that moves forward in a nocturnal background: Sunsetter… An enigmatic title that is rich in meaning – impossible to translate – and quite emblematic of Marlon Wobst’s new works.
If lucid observations of easy living existences were predominant in his work until now, a certain gravity seems to have taken over Marlon Wobst’s world. It cohabitates nevertheless with the playful, whimsical scenes that the artist cherishes. An evolution can also be seen in the way he paints: the juxtaposed colour planes and expressive gestures bring life to compositions where figures are often made of a few brushstrokes. The coloured matter creates a world less defined where figures barely stand out against big spaces that are deserted, wintery, sometimes heavenly – or even immersed in the ocean where they come face to face with blood red skies. It is warm, it is cold, the light is intense, almost blinding, and the water is rising. Nature, its elements, seem to reign as supreme.
As always, colour plays a major role in Marlon Wobst’s work. Dark tones have made their way through; the world has dimmed the light, and from a daytime vaudeville we are now immersed in a dark ‘théâtre noir’ setting. The decor makes it harder to find one’s bearings, but the delicate and personal palette subtly gleams and resists obscurity.
With Sunsetter, Marlon Wobst plays it by ear. Sometimes vision only offers bodies, a way to find comfort and enjoy, a toilet paper roll left in a room as an evocation of presence. At other times, this vision broadens to offer a perspective both terrible and splendid in its extravagance. There, one can feel helpless, fragile, or on the other hand, overwhelmed but completely and totally alive.
Agenda
Opening
Sunsetter
Thursday 27.01.2022
Galerie Maria Lund
Publications and texts
Summer thinking
Farida Le Suavé
Didier Boussarie
Peter Neuchs
Lyndi Sales
Marlon Wobst
Shoi
03.07 - 05.09.2020
Summer thinking
Presentation
A small drawing by Shoi titled Spring 2020 served as a catalyst for this exhibition. It shows a building in front of a sunset. Out of the windows, human silhouettes can be seen, whereas in the street, void from any human presence, an elephant and two cats are strolling and being carefully observed by a bat hanging from a tree… Naive, rich, amusing, spontaneous and precise; this was confinement. Adding to the tragedy of Coronavirus, which plunged the entire humanity into profound questioning, the heightened visibility of the increasing material distress, systemic racism and the suppression of human rights such as freedom of speech appeared. As if a giant looking glass was being hung above our old planet to show us the pain, questioning and difficulties we each have to face.
In this context, artists are both participants and observers who absorb, filter and transform life experience and the state of things. Some express it through their work; others keep it at a distance, by offering an elsewhere, an escape.
Agenda
Late night opening
Summer thinking
Friday, July 3rd
Until 9 pm
Galerie Maria Lund
Sunday opening
Summer thinking
Sunday, July 26st
2 - 7 pm
Galerie Maria Lund
Vernissage
Migrations
Samedi 16 novembre 2019
18h-20h30
Galerie Maria Lund
Artist talk
Nicolai Howalt & Esben Klemann
Samedi 16 novembre 2019
17h
Galerie Maria Lund
Artist talk
Nicolai Howalt & Esben Klemann
Samedi 16 novembre 2019
17h
Galerie Maria Lund
Press
La peinture métaphysique de Peter Martensen
L'Oeil
Septembre 2017
N° 704
Fabien Simode
Peter Martensen "ravage " l'entendement
Libre Belgique - Arts Libre
23 Août 2017
Semaine du 23 au 29 Août 2017
Roger-Pierre Turine
Vous avez dit "Complot" ?
Dossier
Le Monde diplomatique
Juin 2015
N°735
Dossier illustré par Peter Martensen
Publications and texts
Titre
Dates
Contrairement à une opinion répandue, le Lorem Ipsum n’est pas simplement du texte aléatoire. Il trouve ses racines dans une oeuvre de la littérature latine classique datant de 45 av. J.-C.,
Relax
Marlon Wobst
13.09. – 09.11.2019
Presentation
RELAX. Unwind… Whatever happens happens. Why worry ? Nothing will change anyway. Why bother ? Dance, dive, you only live once. And you know, giving yourself a treat won’t hurt.
On planet Earth, the show goes on, waters are rising as well as temperatures. In international organizations, one talks and talks as democracies are slowly slip-sliding, religious wars spreading and spas filling up… In Marlon Wobst’s newest works, united under the rather ambiguous title RELAX, the artist focuses on the microcosmos of the individual against the backdrop of the vast world’s reality. The artist depicts a hedonistic and lascivious world. He shows us an intimacy, of our body in communication with the Other and its relationship to the environment, to the elements. Bodies are looking for contact, the tactile; they explore in groups or alone; they move, sip, observe, look at each other…exist.
With RELAX, Marlon Wobst asserts his ability to work as a fiercely efficient and sophisticated master puppeteer. He plays his game of appearing and disappearing, birth and transformation on a stage of quasi-abstract matter, where scenes and skits review contemporary humanity. If lightness, humor and tenderness are very much present, you mustn’t be fooled. The puppeteer has a tight grip.
Publications and texts
L'Oasi
Marlon Wobst
08.09. > 31.10.2017
Presentation
Masses of bodies, flesh, compressions, accumulations, contemplative and contemplated bodies – L’Oasi brings the modern tribe together in the gourmand, knowing and voyeuristic eye of Marlon Wobst: Games, pantie intimacy, hedonism, movements, mundane and absurd poses – you name it – everything goes, everything is shown… The title of the exhibition – L’Oasi – the eponymous name of an Italian beach where the artist often went when he was younger becomes a metaphor for existence. Ondaaaaa (wave) cry out the bathers when a huge wave arrives and that’s it – they jump and dive! The bodies are displayed with a mix of narcissistic staging, imperfections and vulnerability – thus going against the spectacular imagery of our aestheticized culture with striking finesse. A stated carnivore, Marlon Wobst feeds on the human life that surrounds him. Very often, it is a detail that sets off an artwork – which first aim is to call out, trigger curiosity, question and subsequently, to take the spectator to another level where composition, colour and even the work’s matter offer their particular narration. For if Marlon Wobst is indeed an observer and a stage director, he’s equally an eager manipulator of matter.
Sincere and involved but also a mischievous poet, the artist takes us from heartbreaking, hilarious and goofy situations to an affected smile by bestowing his work with a good dose of humor, and at times a magical or mythological dimension, that questions the true nature of the situation presented.
Starter
Marlon Wobst
06.11.2015 - 09.01.2016
Presentation
For his first solo exhibition in France, the painter Marlon Wobst chose the suitable title Starter, after an eponymous work showing a runner on the verge of starting. The viewing angle recalls television cameras documenting a race: its oblique position behind the runner enables to fully capture the tension and concentration of the moment. All around is a mist of shades of grey. The attention is entirely directed towards the runner.
Translating isolated situations, details that gripped him are characteristics of Marlon Wobst’s universe. Figures are often in full action but the entire scene is detached from a precise context: the space is that of a matter where glimmers of superimposed colours vibrate. There, the everyday activities and elements represented slip towards a dreamlike universe – a world where the substance is that of painting. But make no mistake; if painting as a statement and possibility admittedly has a privileged place in Marlon Wobst’s work, this doesn’t necessarily mean that he bids farewell to the real world: often very raw forays of daily events or of the intimate run alongside the poetic and a good dose of humor.