Ida Applebroog "Ida Applebroog"

14.02–28.03.1992
de Appel, Prinseneiland 7, Amsterdam

Emetic fields, 1989
© Cary Markerink, Amsterdam

Church of St. Francis Xavier, 1987
© Cary Markerink, Amsterdam

De Appel was showing work by the American artist Ida Applebroog from February 14th to March 28th. In spite of several large exhibitions and museum purchases in America, Applebroog's work was not widely known back then. A narrow selection from Applebroog's best work of the last ten years distilled the essence of her penetrating oeuvre. ‘Applebroog, who has previously worked in performance, sculpture and film, has always been a 'radical outsider', a standpoint she maintained during her career as a painter, starting in 1974. Initially she concentrated on making cartoonlike drawings and series of small paintings. The huge works in which she can depict image worlds of greater complexity date only from the 1980s. Her emphasis has come to lie more and more on terse social themes, which are presented within unorthodox compositions in a seemingly chaotic way. In a surprising combination of comic strips and expressively painted fragments, she depicts the individual confronted by violent or seemingly idyllic scenes of everyday life. Bizarre figures taken from newspaper photos and reproduced at larger than life-size are assigned monumental roles as perpetrators or victims of catastrophes. The scenes evince personal suffering, but always bear a relation to wider social issues. Applebroog's painted statements are never unequivocal, but in their complexity, they throw light on the selective processes by which we absorb or reject information. Obsessed and anxious figures, and blind mindless creatures populate Applebroog's epic collage-paintings, which, like altar-pieces, lay claim to their territory on the walls and challenge the moderate dimensions of the gallery space.’ (Invitation text by Saskia Bos)