Vera Palme works with what’s already there. She takes sustenance from the congested body of the past, and without necessarily taking it face-value, uses it as a quarry to reflect on conflicting sensations. She likes to revisit, draw from and occasionally capsize decisions made previously, not only those made by herself. For instance: applying combined forms of repetition and copy, fusion and fragmentation, as well as pointed emphasis, or interruption and discontinuation, it can all add up to new ambiguities or it finds release in the insistence of multiplied doublings, which can be silly too. In this light Vera Palme delves into the developing process of a few of her past exhibitions, and talks about producing text about one’s own work, writing in collaboration or within the context of the work of others; all of which she sees as part of an Escheresque spiral staircase of exchange in the making.

Working primarily in painting and writing, Vera Palme reflects on the specificity of the medium and its various forms of reception. She addresses tensions that lie between abstraction and representation, meaning and emptiness. She processes these tensions through works that convey layeredness, not least through an excessive application of paint or the calculated congestion of phrase. She studied at Weißensee Kunsthochschule Berlin and at Städelschule in Frankfurt am Main from where she graduated in 2017. Recent solo exhibitions include ‘Immer realistischere Malerei‘ at Galerie Buchholz in Berlin and ‚Frankfurter Kreuz‘ at Bizarro in Copenhagen. Her work has also been shown in a number of group shows like ‘Hoi Köln’ at Kölnischer Kunstverein, Cologne and Biennale für Freiburg 2 in Freiburg (both 2023).

The lecture will be held in English.