Perry Rubenstein Gallery Announces: Zilla Leutenegger "Rocksie"

For Immediate Release

PERRY RUBENSTEIN GALLERY
527 WEST 23RD STREET
ANNOUNCES

ZILLA LEUTENEGGER
ROCKSIE

March 25 – April 30, 2010
Opening Reception, Thursday, March 25, 2010, 6:00 – 8:00 PM

"Zilla Leutenegger's works are short videos, often part of an installation within which she stages herself in a poetic and delicate manner, in the simplest of fictions. From her very first creations, the elementary is pervasive, in the technique as much as in the scenarios, which are reduced to very simple actions."
– Laurence Dreyfus, 100 Video Artists, Exit Publicaciones, Madrid 2010

Perry Rubenstein Gallery is pleased to announce Zilla Leutenegger's Rocksie, the artist's first solo exhibition with the gallery. The show will feature new video installations and drawings.

Drawing is the root of Zilla Leutenegger's practice, whether manifested in a wall drawing, a projection, or a traditional work on paper. Leutenegger incorporates drawing into various media; oftentimes video and/or animation are combined in installations that may span an entire room or building, or they may be confined to a small swatch of the wall. Playing with notions of space and time, the two-dimensional aspect of her drawing – be it on the wall, on paper, or animated by video – is often combined with three-dimensional objects to create a stage of sorts for the imagination. Exploring scenes or moments that have poetic simplicity, her drawings and videos are images of ideas, more sketches than precise renderings; they are line drawings produced freehand.

While focusing on universal themes, including architecture, domesticity, fantasy, and childhood, Leutenegger is not concerned with imposing an overarching plan or concept. Rather, she wants the viewer to bring his own thoughts to the image or environment she creates. Leutenegger herself (or her silhouette or shadow) is most often the lone figure in the work, which points to a "solitariness" but also an exchange.

The artist expects the viewer to play a participatory role. As viewer, you feel as if you've been let in on a secret. The subtle ambiguity of the work allows it to float between playfulness and melancholy with exquisite sincerity; Leutenegger draws where she wants to stay and where you want to go.

In this exhibition Leutenegger explores courage in its myriad incarnations. Although she features prominently in her own work, it is not about self-portraiture. Leutenegger acts as an everyman; the figure can also be the viewer and she is by no means projecting her persona. In Rocksie, simple office supplies are taken specifically from the gallery and are arranged on a table made from laminated board balanced atop two sawhorses. Leutenegger uses gallery pencils, scissors and various materials to connect the work to its location. The table acts as a landscape with a video projection of a woman practicing boxing, while the sound of a fist hitting a punching bag echoes throughout the gallery.

The second installation, Heavy Bag recalls an earlier work titled Lucellino (2004) in that the artist uses motion and light to create the effect of live animation. This time, the imagery is of a figure pushing a punching bag over and over. Rhinoceros is a shadow play of a woman, perhaps erotic, straddling a small sculpture of the exotic animal. This installation is particularly vague, concentrating on shape and movement. The viewer is cast as a peeping tom, able only to make out the silhouettes in the projection.

Leutenegger's oeuvre often deals with aloneness, solidarity and the mundane aspects of life. With Rocksie, the focus is courage: be it the courage required to ride a Rhinoceros, to train for a boxing match or to simply go through daily life.

Zilla Leutenegger was born, lives and works in Zurich. Past solo institutional exhibitions include Kunstmuseum des Kantons Thurgau, Warth (2008); CCA Center for Contemporary Art, Tel-Aviv (2007); Kunsthalle Wien, Vienna (2006), Fundació "La Caixa", Sala Montcada, Barcelona (2004). Recent group exhibitions include Sprengel Museum Hannover, Hannover (2008), Parasol Unit, London (2007); Haus der Kunst, Munich (2007); Sammlung Goetz, Munich (2006); Tate Modern, London (2005); Museo de Arte Contemporaneo de Castilla y León, León (2005) Yokohama Museum of Art, Yokohama (2005), Museum of Modern Art, Shanghai (2005), Schaulager, Basel (2004), Museo de Arte Moderno de Buenos Aires, Buenos Aires (2003), Palais de Tokyo, Paris (2003), Kunst-Werke Institute for Contemporary Art, Berlin (2003).

For more information about Zilla Leutenegger, please visit:
www.perryrubenstein.com

Perry Rubenstein Gallery
527 West 23 Street
New York, NY 10011
T 212.627.8000
F 212.627.6336
E info@perryrubenstein.com
www.perryrubenstein.com
Gallery Hours: Tuesday – Saturday, 10:00 AM to 6:00 PM.

Members of the press please contact:
Molly Klais Springer
Perry Rubenstein Gallery
T 212.627.8000
E molly@perryrubenstein.com