AMSTERDAM.- Annet Gelink Gallery is presenting Carla Klein’s (1970) sixth solo show with the gallery.

In this exhibition Klein presents a new series of paintings depicting greenhouse interiors throughout Europe. In her oeuvre Klein likes to focus on the artificial ‘worlds within the world’ such as swimming pools, airports, subway stations and now greenhouses.

The large-scale and panoramic canvasses invite the viewer to step into an atmosphere, as if you are passing through the scenery yourself.

Based on photographs taken and developed by her, the paintings show settings that seem familiar, but also feel deserted and impersonal. Compared to photography, painting is a slow medium that asks for a different kind of attention. Through painting Klein researches the experience of the captured image, exploring the relationship between reality and its representation. Often also including the ‘mistakes’ that happen during the photographic processing such as scratches, lens flares or light leaks.

Her latest works not only show the flora and fauna you would expect but also focus on the architectural elements: window frames, tubes and pipes that are so clearly present in a greenhouse. There is an amount of alienation, spaces clearly designed by humans but without any signs of people being present. Although they might refer to existing subjects, her paintings aren’t meant as a direct reference or representation of places and situations.

Klein never wants to be too obvious within her work, her settings could be nowhere and everywhere. Processing the immateriality of the images though the materiality of the paint, she reaches a sublimation: the landscapes become objects in themselves, independent from their original subjects. Almost mirages, they leave the viewer in the spatial atmosphere created by shapes, colors and brush strokes.

Carla Klein (Zwolle, 1970) lives and works in Rotterdam. She studied at the Royal Academy of Art, The Hague (19881993) and Rijksakademie, Amsterdam (1994-1995). Recipient of the Prins Bernhard Cultuurfonds Charlotte Köhler Award in 1999. Since the mid-1990s, Klein has exhibited her work consistently throughout Europe and the United States. Recent notable exhibitions include: two-person presentation of Carla Klein and Marlene Dumas, Museum voor Modern Realisme, Ruurlo, the Netherlands (2017) solo presentation at Contemporary Art Museum, St. Louis, Missouri (2015), the Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive, CA (2005), Jarla Partilager, Stockholm (2007). Her paintings have also been shown in group exhibitions: Bass Museum of Art in Miami, FL; Wexner Center for the Arts, Columbus, OH; Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen and Witte de With Center for Contemporary Art, Rotterdam; Denver Art Museum, among others. Klein’s work is included in the permanent collections of the Berkeley Art Museum, CA; Miami Art Museum, FL; Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, Rotterdam; Gemeentemuseum, The Hague; and Thermenmuseum, Heerlen, NL.