Christina Zimpel

Christina Zimpel (°1961, New York, USA)

The works seem to hover in an ulterior space, where what Zimpel delineates with her brush or her striking, saturated colour choices is just as crucial to the image as what she chooses to omit, sublimate, or suggest.  Faces, bodies, or even the occasional still life are brought to life with a confident - if reductive - approach. Somehow these large planes of colour seem charged with emotion and an unbridled desire to break the rules of figurative painting. She credits some of this to her youth in Australia in the '70s, as well as the folkloric teachings of her Hungarian mother, both of which find their way into the soul of these paintings. 

She states that her figure, typically female and typically of a Victorian-esque ilk, is portrayed 'how they might present themselves at an audition in our time. How to behave in that discomfort is interesting to me. I am, via my characters, inviting myself onto the stage to express these delicate feelings.' This feigned portrayal comes across, through stifled poses or strange colour combinations, presenting a feeling of disquiet that is as inviting as it is enervating. 

Where Zimpel does seem to indulge in excess is in the posings and stylings of these glamorous (or wannabe glamorous) women. Luxuriant hairstyles allow unbridled brushstrokes that curl and introduce excess into her strict compositions. 

"I exaggerate, reduce and modernize archetypes," she states. Alluding to punk, Belle Epoque, and Romanesque sources of inspiration. "With attention to body language I’m representing dignity, awkwardness, and humor."