MONIQUE FRYDMAN: États d' Âme

Galerie Dutko is pleased to present from 1 October  to 21 November  « États d’Âme », an exhibition devoted to the latest series by French artist Monique Frydman.

Bringing together a previously unseen body of work created between 2023 and 2026, this fifth solo exhibition with the gallery reveals a subtle yet essential evolution in the artist’s practice, as she continues to affirm the existential vitality of painting throughout her work. The exhibition’s title raises a profound question about the very nature of painting as a meeting place between subjectivities.

The paintings in « États d’Âme » thus become repositories for continually renewed experiences, in which memory, emotion and lived experience give the work its vital presence.

« Is a state of mind not the very subject of painting? Can the painter make visible what moves them over the course of the hours and days? The same painting will appear different according to the viewer’s own state of mind. It is these intimate experiences that give the painting its multiple existences. And yet, the work escapes both the person who made it and the person who beholds it. Whatever happens, it remains there, in its permanence and solitude. »

Monique Frydman

Born in 1943, Monique Frydman occupies a major place in the history of contemporary French abstraction. Since the 1970s, Monique Frydman has developed a singular abstract language grounded in the slow and meticulous impregnation of pigments, pastels and binders into a variety of supports—including linen canvas, cotton, Japanese paper and tarlatan. This practice is complemented by frottage: ropes, strings and other elements placed beneath the canvas leave their discreet impressions upon the painted surface, giving rise to a network of lines in which drawing, memory and material converge. 

Her work has been exhibited in numerous institutions, including the Louvre Museum in Paris, the Centre Pompidou, the Matisse Museum in Nice and Cateau-Cambrésis, the Parasol Unit Foundation for Contemporary Art in London and the Contemporary Art Museum in Kanazawa, Japan. Her works are held in several major French and international collections: the Centre Pompidou in Paris, the Musée des Beaux-Arts in Caen and the Contemporary Art Museum in Kanazawa, Japan.