In “Biel Lieb,” Olivia van Kuiken’s inaugural exhibition at Château Shatto, oil paintings of untamed, bold color and mark-making swing between styles of ink wash, graphic novel, pixel and gestures on the verge of becoming scripture, spellbinding the gallery. Fuchsia, aubergine, canary yellow, vermillion and lilac burst forth on the canvases, contained by artist frames and room dividers, allowing multiple works to be sistered together. In terms of portrayal, an important element of van Kuiken’s work is that within a singular canvas, there is no sense of one singular realm. Instead, it seems as though multiple provinces or domains—corporeal, notebook, cosmos and delusion—are peeled back and dripped into one another. Influenced by Unica Zürn’s 1968 novel, The Trumpets of Jericho, her paintings similarly guide viewers through surreal landscapes where reality and a sense of self disintegrate. Welcoming mania, angst and alienation, van Kuiken’s paintings become a psychic apparatus with fluid confines. It’s a kind of madness that would be mentally paralyzing in real-time, but in painting, the disorder shines like a perfect secret we aren’t meant to understand, where the journey may be to become a stranger to oneself.

Château Shatto
1206 S. Maple Ave. Suite 1030
Los Angeles, CA
On view through April 6, 2024