Rita Ackermann: Mama

In lively and animated large-scale paintings, Rita Ackermann’s latest body of work layers paint with scrapings of impasto and oil stick in order to express complex narratives. Figures and motifs rise to the surface of canvases, only to dissolve and reappear elsewhere again. An inheritor of the gestural abstractions of such American masters as Willem de Kooning and Cy Twombly, her images are the product of automatic gestures, a subconscious unfolding on the canvas. Hers is a study of relationships – between figuration and abstraction, between personal and collective experience within. Accompanying these vibrant works as a critical essay by Gianni Jetzer investigating the significance of the ‘Mama’ works, a fake interview with the artist by Harmony Korine, and Scott Griffin’s tribute to the artist. Finally, the book includes a poem written by Ackermann, emphasising the importance of her drawing practice to her emotive work as a whole.