MALAGA.- The Centro de Arte Contemporáneo de Málaga is presenting the first solo exhibition in a Spanish museum on the work of Adrian Ghenie. Curated by Fernando Francés, it includes around 30 large and small format paintings and is the most significant exhibition on Ghenie in a European museum to date. The artist’s work conveys an atmosphere comparable to that of film, which is one of his principal sources of inspiration, while other references include different episodes in European history, particularly that of the 20th century, for which Ghenie makes use of archives and old books. Ghenie interprets the Cold War, World War II and leading personalities from those periods from his unique and distinctive viewpoint, introducing and making use of psychoanalytical and autobiographical elements. Adrian Ghenie currently lives and works in Cluj (Rumania) and Berlin (Germany).

“For me the issue is how to create a painting that offers us the intimacy of the film experience, but which continues to be a painting” is how Adrian Ghenie (born Baia Mare, Rumania, 1977) sums up the creative process behind his work. The CAC Málaga is now offering the first presentation of the work of this Rumanian artist in Spain. The size of the exhibition, which features around 30 large and small scale works, makes it the most important to be held in Europe to date. Among recurring themes in Ghenie’s work are key moments in recent history, particularly those referring to 20th-century wars and conflicts, including World War II and the Cold War. In Ghenie’s work these themes are reflected through well-known individuals whose actions in some way changed the course of history, not just with regard to politics but also in the fields of science and art. In addition to thrillers and slapstick comedies, other sources of inspiration for the artist are archives, documentaries and old books.

For Fernando Francés, director of the CAC Málaga: “Adrian Ghenie is a painter who knows how to create suspense, how to direct the scene and also how to arouse in the viewer that magical combination of disquiet and expectation which so many artists aspire to but so few are able to produce. Ghenie makes masterful use of these codes, which are notably close to cinematic effects. He sets out to leave traces of uncertainty, question marks hanging in the air and enigmas still to be resolved. What we feel when looking at his painting is something like being a minor actor in a thriller with carefully devised scripts and settings that seem to have been created with the intention of slowly introducing the viewer into the story, allowing him to be caught up by each element. The viewer is thus that minor actor, given that the main role is reserved for characters who are icons of modern history: individuals whose actions have changed the rhythm and speed of history, science and art and who have repeatedly provoked surprise, always as a result of conscious thought rather than effect. I refer to something like the mystery and suspense experienced by the viewer when watching Hitchcock’s North by Northwest (1959) or Psycho (1960), or David Lynch’s popular Twin Peaks series (1990), to refer to two directors who are key references for Ghenie.”

The artist’s unique style means that despite being stereotypes of an era and universally known, these individuals are perceived in Ghenie’s work in a very different way to the habitual one: here they are shown with their faces distorted and with only a few recognisable features that allow us to know who they are. Adolf Hitler (Untitled, 2011), Charles Darwin, and Vincent van Gogh (Self-portrait as Vincent van Gogh 3, 2014) are among Ghenie’s subjects. In other compositions the artist depicts historic events, such as famous people’s funerals or burial places (Duchamp’s Funeral II, 2009, or Stalin’s Tomb, 2006), or episodes from their lives (Charles Darwin at the Age of 75, 2014). Ghenie’s work is filled with personal and autobiographical experiences, and by distorting these famous personalities he aims to convey how, from his childhood onwards, he experienced the most recent and crucial changes that have affected different fields of life such as politics, science and art. For Ghenie, on occasions we need to return to the past in order to understand the present.

The combination of real images based on documentary photographs and Ghenie’s own experiences come together to form a mental collage that provides his starting point. The political situation in mid-20th century Europe, with the beginning and end of the Nazi regime, the fall of Communism, the bombing and destruction of cities and the intense propaganda characteristic of that period all gave rise to a society with experiences and viewpoints notably different to that of other historical periods. Drawing on psychoanalytical concepts, Ghenie attempts to reconstruct these experiences in his paintings in order to arrive at a better understanding of subsequent changes.

Ghenie analyses the power of the image and how it is seen and remains in our subconscious, making use of collective memory – another of his sources – to recreate these experiences. In order to do so, he has experimented with different sizes of canvases and with colour. Ghenie has also made a close study of artists such as Velázquez and Rembrandt and of periods including the Renaissance and Baroque and their significance within art history, although his current reference points are contemporary artists. Over time, his art has become increasingly complex and in his most recent works he has moved towards abstraction.

Adrian Ghenie was born in Baia Mare, Rumania, in 1977. In 2001 he graduated from the University of Art and Design in Cluj (Rumania). In 2006 he held his first solo exhibition at the Plan B gallery in Cluj, which marked the start of his increasing recognition. Among the artist’s most important solo exhibitions are those held at the Contemporary Art Museum in Denver, USA (2012/2013); at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Ghent, Belgium (2010/2011); and at the National Museum of Contemporary Art in Bucharest, Rumania (2009/2010). Among group shows in which his work has been included are those held at the Pinault Foundation, Palazzo Grassi, Venice, Italy (2011); at Tate Liverpool, UK (2008); at the Prague Biennial in the Czech Republic (2007/2009); and at the Bucharest Biennial, Rumania (2008). Ghenie’s work is also represented in major public collection, including the Hammer Museum in Los Angeles, the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles, the Museum of Modern Art in Antwerp, the Museum of Modern Art in San Francisco, and the Museum of Contemporary Art in Ghent. In 2005 he co-founded the Plan B gallery in Cluj, a space for the creation and display of contemporary art and for research into Rumanian art of the last fifty years. Ghenie lives and works in Cluj and Berlin.