Anj Smith's interior landscapes at the Stefano Bardini Museum

“I love the idea that painting, pointless technologically, can still hypnotise and seduce us.” Says artist Anj Smith, a statement that leaves space for reflection, not only about painting, but art itself.
Art is created and consumed because human beings crave to express themselves, to look at something beautiful, something that moves them, something that makes them question themselves and the world, something that shocks them even.

It doesn’t really need to serve a practical purpose, one that is “useful” in your everyday life, but despite this, it has naturally revealed itself in the past as a fundamental element in the development of the culture of all civilizations and has now become the mirror of our society.

The exhibition Anj Smith. A Willow Grows Aslant the Brook, the first solo exhibition in an Italian museum by the British painter, displays a selection of 12 of her works. Extremely detailed images, representing the artist’s interior landscapes.

Touching themes such as identity, mortality, sexuality, Anj Smith’s art speaks to the viewers and intrigues them. Her paintings, consisting of portraits, still life and desolated landscaps, populated by tired faces, objects and strange animals, are somewhat reminiscent of works of surrealist artists like Max Ernst or Salvador Dalí.
The elegance and precision of Anj Smiths’s works creates a strong contrast with the sense of disquiet that they arouse, they leave the viewer with a sense of discomfort that can’t be quite explained. 

Thanks to the collaboration between Hauser & Wirth and Museo Novecento, they now interact with the extraordinary collection of ancient art of the Stefano Bardini Museum.

The observer is invited to be patient and to look with attention at these images full of details. This way the artists makes us slow down, process, think, in order to regain some consciousness instead of keep on sleepwalking though our lives.
On display until May 1st 2022 at the Stefano Bardini Museum.