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PEGGY FRANCK
»A cat had got up and left the room«

Opening: Friday, APRIL 13TH, 7pm–10pm
Exhibition: APRIL 14TH – JUNE 6TH, 2012

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 18TH OPEN till 10pm


Some pieces of wood, mirror and Plexiglass are leaning casually against the gallery wall, a couple of chairs are piled up and a lightbulb on a roll of cable is lying on the floor. At first sight this might look like a random grouping or as remnants from an action that took place in the past.
Together they form an arrangement of several works put together by Dutch artist Peggy Franck. While watching the artist at work in the gallery, we see her move the objects and materials intuitively towards an accurate standstill.
The objects and materials are touched in this same visceral way with paint, some with softer traces, and blushes of spraypaint, others more strongly with bright colored brushstrokes. In her recent work Peggy Franck focused on the painting that she used in her earlier works as mere parts of photographed arrangements and installations. Moreover aiming for spontaneity and directness but now on a single surface.
There are some brushstrokes painted on another empty gallery wall together forming the shape of a rainbow. Something that at first had arisen from a very unconscious gesture by Peggy Franck testing some paint on her studio wall. An element she now deliberately repeats from time to time in exhibition spaces.

The works titled »Reintroducing the familiar: soft yellow and blue«, are nothing more than painted lines on Plexiglass sticks. They nevertheless become sculptural, the sticks are partly clear, inviting light and reflection. The image changes depending on the position of the viewer; somehow ephemeral, what is present this moment, has gone the next.
The piece »Combinations and circumstances: Chairs (Thonet)« consists of three used Thonet chairs. While one of the chairs seems inviting, the others are put on top of each other and rather seem reserved. They give the impression that they could have been already present in the space. Next to the Thonet label that we see on the bottom of one chair sits a small drop of paint. What was already there and what has been put there by the artist?

On the opposite wall the work »A cat had got up and left the room« is hanging, a diptych, existing of a mirroring sheet of paper and an analogue photograph. The sheet is not a clear mirror and has some small dents, it transforms the reflected gallery space. The photograph »A cat had got up and left the room«, which gave the title to the exhibition, presents a corner of the artists studio; a variety of materials, of painted and unpainted wood, a canvas, some photographs printed on A4 sheets and a mirror in front of an unfinished wall. The photograph has frozen a moment in time, while the sheet of paper seems to be forever searching, comprising any possible image.

In this same way the artist constantly moves work around. The lightbulb »Unusual Patient (Asian)« which we see lying on the floor, has before been hanging from ceilings of exhibition spaces. A question arises: Will the cat still return to the room?









installation views


Peggy Franck, »Read the sky«, 2012, paint on wall


Peggy Franck, »A cat had got up and left the room«, 2012, C-print, 100 x 70 cm


Peggy Franck, »A cat had got up and left the room«, 2012
Diptychon: Chromolux paper, 100 x 70 cm ; C-print, 100 x 70 cm



Peggy Franck, »Rainmaker«, 2012, Acrylic paint and Gouache on Plexiglass, 60 x 30 cm



Peggy Franck, »Inward attention«, 2011, Gouache on canvas mounted on board, 40 x 40 cm


Peggy Franck, »Combinations and circumstances: Chairs (Thonet)«, 2011, Gouache on board


Peggy Franck, »The intentions and the attitude of mind« 2012, Diptych
Acrylic paint and Gouache on canvas mounted on wood 40 x 40 cm,
Acrylic spraypaint on canvas, 39 x 39 cm


Peggy Franck, »The unusual patient (I + II)«, 2012, Acrylsprühfarbe, Hausfarbe, Glühbirne, Kabel, Maße variabel