RIDGEFIELD, CT.- For her first solo museum exhibition at The Aldrich, Amelie Chabannes continues her exploration of relationships and how dependency between individuals can blur and destroy personal identity.

Chabannes has created three large, site‐specific wall drawings for The Aldrich, taking as subjects two well‐known couples from the art world, Marina Abramović and Ulay, and Gilbert & George.

The artist’s combined interests in psychology and art history led her to the opposite of the primacy of individual identity, referred to in psychology as “fusional relationships.” Fusion is defined as the desire of two individuals to become one, which is most commonly manifested in society by the popular romantic notion of “two halves make a whole,” fueled by the belief—both conscious and unconscious—that bliss is achieved through unity. But in some circumstances fusion is taken to an extreme, and the result can be the pathology of damaging dependency, or an attempt at a kind of liberation.

Aldrich exhibitions director Richard Klein explains, “In her work, Chabannes fuses the couples’ individual images, and hence their relationships, through an obsessive, overlapping drawing technique that culminates in violent excavation of her drawing surfaces emphasizing both psychological and artistic obsession.”

Amelie Chabannes: Double Portraits and a Fourth Hand is part of a series of exhibitions and related programming presenting an array of approaches taken by contemporary artists who push the boundaries of drawing, the most direct and universal means of visual expression. The exhibition has been organized by Richard Klein, The Aldrich’s exhibitions director.

Amelie Chabannes (b. Paris, France) works in sculpture, installation, and drawing. She studied Architecture and Fine Arts in a leading French Art School, ENSAD, and worked for many years with architects and designers on major projects, including a cultural center in Riga, Latvia. She moved to New York in 2005 and currently lives and works in Brooklyn. Her work has been exhibited in international venues including New York; Berlin; Rio de Janiero; Paris; Miami; Beijing; Caracas, Venezuela; Bergen, Norway; Marseille, France; and Mexico City, She was awarded the International Center Award of Excellence for Fine Arts (New York) along with artist Yoshitomo Nara. Her work has been reviewed in publications such as The Wall Street Journal, Art In America, Flash Art (US and Italy), White Wall Magazine, City Art, Timeout New York, Liberation, France‐Amerique, Flavorpill, M Magazine, Elle (France), Architektur und Wohnen, Verso Arts et Lettres, The Visual Art Beat Magazine, among others. Selected collections include the Progressive Collection, Cleveland, Ohio, as well as numerous private collections in the United States, Europe, Russia, and Japan. Amelie Chabannes is represented by Stephan Stoyanov Gallery, New York.