Artist Interview
蜂后的噩梦
Der Albtraum der Bienenkönigin
上海狮語画廊
Leo Gallery Shanghai
艺术家|塞西尔·伦珀特
Artists|Cécile Lempert
展期|Duration
2024.5.25-7.14
地点|Venue
上海徐汇区武康路376号武康庭内
Ferguson Lane, 376 Wu Kang Road, Xuhui District, Shanghai
Artist Interview | Cécile Lempert
Q: First of all, thank you for coming here. We know it's your first solo exhibition in China. And you have also prepared a new body of work. Can you talk a little bit about your thoughts and philosophy behind these works and how you got the inspiration for The Queen Bee’s Nightmare ?
Cécile Lempert: For this body of work, I had the initiation moment, a drawing for my son called Der Albtraum der Bienenkönigin (The Queen Bee’s Nightmare).
I was very touched by this drawing when I first saw it. The story he told me about having a bad dream and then translating it into a drawing also touched me. I was impressed by the child's ability to use his creative skills to overcome an unpleasant and uncomfortable situation.
The Queen Bee’s Nightmare, 2024
Distemper and pastel on canvas
120 x 300cm
Q: Your creations always have a very close link to your own growth, your own family background, and your own birth. How did this kind of creative interest first emerge?
Cécile Lempert: I have always had a very personal approach to my work. I started it when I began my studies. I started with self-portraits that I made in front of a mirror. And I always thought this was something. Or maybe the most honest thing I can do. Even though I would say that nowadays, I'm able to involve a broader context and include other topics, not just personal ones. It's always something I use as a starting point actually.
During my studies and my degree show, I examined my standpoint. I need to have a base from which I can work. And now I'm also able to involve not only my personal family history but also other family histories. So, this is also a very interesting new aspect of my work. But I think, especially in this exhibition, I stayed within this very personal environment.
Installation View
Q: You're talking about your family history and family relations. So the show is also inspired by your sons. It's closely related to your identity as a mother. Would you say it somehow made it, like, also a feminist perspective? Can you share more about your relationship with your son and how that has shaped your work?
Cécile Lempert: I will probably put it a little bit differently. Because in my eyes, it's more about seeing it from the child's perspective and taking the child as seriously as I can. So it's not so much about the natural hierarchy between a parent and a child. Because I think it naturally opens up when you start to examine this relationship. Forget about him being a child somehow and putting his perspective of the world on my level somehow. I don't know if it's going in the right direction.
I haven't been super close to children before I had my own family. There are people who are really touched by children in general, but I think I'm not one of those people. So for me, it also took some time to figure out how I could approach him or them. And after a while, I realized that it's really important to see things from his perspective, to be on his eye level. There are situations when I have to be a little more serious about things and make decisions. But I try to understand him, and this is something that brings me very close to him.
Q: I think a lot of your works explore the relationship between individuals and also involve a lot of psychological nuances. How do you understand interpersonal relationships? And how does it affect your works?
Cécile Lemper: This is a hard question, I think. Because it is very difficult for me to answer. Maybe it's because it's the most touching thing for me and it is something that is actually on my subconscious level. Therefore, it's very hard to point to it because it's somehow not a decision I made based on rational reasons, but it's something that feels so natural to occupy my mind with.
So, for me, it's interesting to examine this relationship with this intensity and also with this special approach of using only pieces of a face. Because I can bring a certain ambivalence to the paintings, which actually fits very well with my perception of human relationships and humanity. Somehow, even though I'm not sure if I would exclude animals also, I have a relationship with my surroundings or another subject I'm approaching and choose a deep variety of feelings.
Installation View
Q: Because the title involves a nightmare, and you also have some reflections on our subconscious. What dreams were presented?
Cécile Lempert: I have a very pragmatic view of dreams. I'm not really the type of person who believes dreams are super revealing, like they reveal some psychological states of mind, but not really. But I would consider it a very clever and interesting psychological tool to get along with everyday conflict.
I'm super fascinated by what's involved in your real life and in your dreams. It's sometimes so extremely random. I remember seeing something in space, like a door or a piece of a door, and a certain view. And for some reason, this very view appears in my dream. And this is something I'm very fascinated by. I think it's interesting to have this level between your perception of real life and what's going on in yourself. But I'm not really into trying to read the patterns of dreams because there are motives.
Cécile Lempert at the exhibition
Q: Because you have some paintings about the nightmare scene or that are more childlike or dreamlike. What happened in their dream? Are you trying to dive into the dream world or subconscious through the paintings, or not really?
Cécile Lempert: I'm more interested in the outcome of having such dreams. The reason why the drawings are so interesting to me is that they have activated a creative force that is incredibly intense and powerful in terms of imagery and inventing figures, such as the ghost king. This is actually the core of it. It's trying to understand my son’s imagery somehow and to delve into his creative creativity in front of life.
Installation View
Q: You can share more about the exhibition layout, as you have put a lot of thought into the creation aspect of it. We know that there are many dialogues happening, like eyes looking at the other scene. Can you explain how you built connections between the works?
Cécile Lempert: I would say they are basically two different groups of works. One shows the people and their facial expressions. On the other hand, there are motives that come mainly from the drawings of children, especially from their smiles. For me, it was important to take little journeys through the different rooms.
So I would say that the first floor already brings up the inner conflicts or shows them in a conflicting and strong way. There are forces working with each other. The second part is more like an attempt to solve these conflicts and bring a more neutral but relaxed and reflective mood. It also involves different motives. For example, in this room, I think the horse is very important as an animal. It adds more energy to the space.
Installation View
Q: Unlike many artists, you had a strong curatorial plan. I'm curious about your work process. Do you always have a clear idea of what you want to do for each specific space?
Cécile Lempert: I started to get into this practice, actually, because it also has time constraints. I have to work very focused nowadays, so I don't have as much time anymore to gather a certain amount of works. And then I can choose from them. So I also like to think about the space I'm showing. There are different reasons for my process. And I'm also working with different motifs in one painting. I also work with different paintings in one space, and they should have something to do with each other. So there is something creative in between them. All these three things influence my working process.
Installation View
Q: We saw many long paintings this time, and in some cases, they were separated. You also have kinds of works where you separate the canvases and focus maybe on parts of your body. It more like a film, cutting the screen. What's your thought behind that?
Cécile Lempert: I always like to work with elements from film. I like the idea of bringing slight movement into the paintings or bringing different motives into one canvas. I am able to create a minimum of a narrative without revealing too much and leaving it up to the viewer to make sense of it or to bring both parts together.
I think it comes from my practice during my graduation preparation for my graduation show. When I was using a digital animation program to recreate a room from a story of my mom's life, because the program is made for animation, it already created horizontal scenes. Somehow, this became the starting point for why I stick to horizontal formats so much. But it's like the film moment which is going through the whole practice for a couple of years already.
Installation View
Q: Can you provide more information about the materials you use for your paintings? Some of them seem fragile and delicate, while others are not commonly seen.
Cécile Lempert: I worked on this question a lot during my studies. Because I was really looking for the right paint. I tried many things out, and I stuck to this temper based on rabbit skin glue and different pigments because it allowed me to have a very diverse palette and to work with colors I couldn't find simply in the shop.
Another advantage is that this paint dries quickly. It fits very closely with my drawing process, which is also a crucial part of my practice. Because in the drawings I examine the composition, if the motive actually works or not, and I make my final decisions, or some final decisions already in the drawing. I like the quality of the paint because it has a very translucent quality. It soaks into the canvas.
I also know from mural painting, but it's not a mural painting. It still has the quality of clothes, which I really like. I can go to extremes. I can make it very transparent, but I can also make it very, very dense. And I think what's also helping the motives is that it has a skin-like quality. Also, I usually use pastels to make a little drawing or to fix the composition. And sometimes I try to keep it visible, like the first layer of the drawing. I like this very much and try to keep as much as possible from this process.
Installation View
Q: You also use the Shellack? Rarely seeing that.
Cécile Lempert: This is for paper works. It's also organic. The term is also like the little beetles on leaves, and they produce it. You have like little pieces, like yellowish gold, and you have to dissolve them in alcohol. Then it gets very thick. You have to make it more fluid with the help of alcohol. And then you can prime the paper. Then it won't adhere properly anymore when you apply watercolors. It also has a natural, slow, slightly yellowish color. I like to use it for the big drawings. Materials that are traditionally used for priming, such as distemper or based on rabbit skin glue, as well as Shellack. One is for the preparation of oil painting, and the other is for the paper.
Q: What are your expectations for coming to China? We know it's also your first time. And is there anything you want to say to our audience?
Cécile Lempert: I am very happy to have this opportunity to showcase my works here. And I really hope that the people here can approach them, derive something from them, or be touched by them. I am very curious about the reaction they will receive.
Q: Do you have your next idea? Do you want to try it out in your creation or in the next steps?
Cécile Lempert: I have the advantage of being in the flow, which is something I have to be in. So I'm already preparing a new show, which is also something new. It's more like an installation made out of separate canvases. It creates a group dynamic, like a group of people sitting at one table and somehow interacting and not interacting at the same time. It will be on a wall, but it will be like all the paintings will be connected with each other.
About The Artist
Cécile Lempert
Born in 1994 in Dortmund, western Germany, now works and lives in Cologne. From 2014 to 2021, she studied at the Dusseldorf Academy of Art with two professors, Peter Piller and Stefan Kurten. In 2019, she participated in the Aq Tushetil Artists' Resident Project in Omalo, Georgia, and was based at the Royal Academy of Arts in the same year. In 2021, Cecile, Domingo Chaves, Sibylle Czichon, and others jointly founded the AURA Art Space.
Cecile attaches great importance to the capture of psychological state and interpersonal relationship in her creation and often extends to the discussion of "belonging" through her personal and family elements. Since graduating from Dusseldorf Academy of Art in 2021, Cecile has held solo exhibitions in several galleries at home and abroad, such as Efremidis Berlin, Elsa Meunier Paris, IAH Seoul, etc. In 2023, she participated in the Cologne Art Fair and the Basel June Art Fair with Efremidis Art Gallery Berlin.
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