BOLOGNA.- MAGMA gallery is presenting “The Most Incredible Things”, the first solo exhibition of Amandine Urruty in Italy, from April 17th to May 29th 2021.
Amandine Urruty was born in Toulouse in 1982. Her incredible technical ability in using graphite and charcoal on paper seems to take us back to our childhood, to our playrooms, to our most distant memories. In fact, each of her 12 works represents a microcosm animated by curious creatures and people. Surreal and mysterious scenes, disturbing and attractive at the same time, in which irreverent masks, toys, macabre puppets and pop icons of the past seem to find themselves in a bizarre family album.
Self portrait with trunk contains the very spirit of the exhibition in small dimensions: the artist stares at us seriously, while wearing a trunk. An image with a classic and extremely ironic appearance, which tells the present but also the childish fun of the disguise, as also happens in the beautiful Estelle.
In Ira and Superbia the two moods are expressed through the actions of the protagonists: children fighting, little masked cheerleaders side by side, budding photographers who enhance the vanity of those who admire themselves in the mirror while hiding their face with a wooden mask. Each particular adds a surreal but coherent detail to the story.
In Outside, Pomegranate, Siblings and The Neverending Story Part I, the subjects are portrayed in poses that can recall turn-of-the-century photography. Obviously, however, their static nature and references to classical painting such as Pomegranate's composition and the anamorphism of the skull in Siblings are immersed in the surreal dimension of Amandine, in which the backgrounds become theatrical backdrops that reinforce the message of the work with meticulousness of the details described.
In Crash and Hunger the technical ability of the artist is enhanced, also thanks to the hyper-realistic details of the cars represented. Finally, the two masterpieces, both large triptychs: Pieces and His Tryptichs. In the first, the characters are hooded, as if to symbolize ghosts, unrecognizable fragments of our memory; in His the color, through an illogical rainbow, bursts and illuminates the scene, whose space is marked by classical statues wearing animal or comic masks. Around them move both curious children and the most bizarre creatures imaginable, inhabitants of the fantastic world created by Amandine Urruty, in which the "most incredible things" can happen.
Since the beginning of her career, the artist has taken part in more than seventy exhibitions around the world, in the most important urban and contemporary art galleries in Europe and the United States. In 2020 she exhibited at the Espace départemental d ’contemporary art in Auch, France; in 2019 Santander University hosted the exhibition of the collection of the Redondo Museum in BODEGA DEL RIOJANO, Spain, including works by Amandine; in 2015 she exhibited her works at the Museum for Contemporary Art MARCO in Monterrey, Mexico. She has done the illustrations for the New York Times, Le Monde, Ikea, Libération, Nike Sportswear and many other major brands. She has also published four monographic books: "Robinet d'Amour" (Les Requins Marteaux) in 2011, "Dommage Fromage" (United Dead Artists, 2014), "Certains l'Aiment Chiot" (Critères, 2018) and "The Party" (United Dead Artists, 2018).
