LOUISE BOURGEOIS

LOUISE BOURGEOIS
is beginning of the 21st centuries. This prominent position is the outcome of a life spanning 90 years and of the constant preoccupation and confrontation with the people, places and experiences of a life as a daughter, a young artist, a wife, a mother. And finally it is the result of the tremendously prolific period she had in recent years. It is precisely her work over the last 20 years that has given Louise Bourgeois a unique standing within the development of modern art and has also brought her career to an appropriate pinnacle. In Paris, where she was born, she met face to face with the moderns of the time. In 1938 she left for New York with her American husband. There she raised three sons and picked up artistically where she had left off with her first Parisian paintings. Only that now she increasingly turned towards sculpture and over the years the objects grew more and more complex and spatial. The development of her artistic thinking though continued to be shaped by her ongoing graphic work, especially during those years when limitations in space and family duties caused a permanent struggle for an identity and for the continuation of her artistic work.  

Who happens to meet Louise Bourgeois today will find her an alert 90 year old enjoying life and expanding an ever more intense oeuvre rooted in the experiences of a long life and concentrated hard work. Not one fibre of her being seems interested in the superficial. The inimitable way in which she asks questions is a mode of thinking and remembering and it goes hand in hand with an absolute candour when it comes to the personal.More than in her art she is interested in people and in her own existence and instead of adhering to theories she opens herself up to all aspects of the human experience. Therefore it is in her own biography and above all in her childhood that she discovers the stimulus and the motifs for her work.  

Louise Bourgeois studied art at a time when the female artist was the exception to the rule in a male-dominated world. The intensive and genuine interest many young artists of both sexes have shown for the person Louise Bourgeois and her work demonstrates how significant an example her development has been for the paradigm shifts society in general and art have seen since then. Against this background the path from youthful individuality and freshness to mature reflection in her work seems a very apt expression of our situation at the outset of a new millennium.   The exhibition at the Kunstraum Innsbruck presents a selection of graphic and sculptural works from the 90ies. The central piece is a complex creation from the Cell-series, the Passage Dangereux. The production of the 90 year old surprises with an ever increasing intensity and vitality.

An exploration of the spacious cage-like structure with all its bizarre furnishings leads us as much into our own as into the artist's memory: 

'My name is Louise Josephine Bourgeois. I was born 24 December 1911, in Paris. All my work in the past 50 years, all my subjects, have found their inspiration in my childhood. My childhood has never lost its magic, it has never lost its mystery, and it has never lost its drama.'

Curator: Gunter Damisch, Wien