Emma Stibbon – Broken Ground

Galerie Bastian is pleased to announce the second solo exhibition of British artist Emma Stibbon opening on 27 April at the gallery space Am Kupfergraben 10 in Berlin. Stibbon’s previous solo exhibition »Ice Mirage« in 2015 was dedicated to large-format drawings of polar landscapes of the Arctic and Antarctic. This forthcoming solo exhibition will feature drawings and printed graphic works by Emma Stibbon, which were executed after a field visit to the volcanoes of Big Island – the largest island of Hawaii.

The PuʻuʻŌʻō crater forms part of the Kīlauea volcano – one of the most active volcanoes on Earth. Since 1983 lava has continuously been streaming from the volcano into the Pacific Ocean, where it then abruptly cools down. Emma Stibbon not only renders the moment of eruption in her works, but also its impact on the landscape. Deep ravines carve open the earth; deserted craters and rising sulphur vapours characterise the scenery. In her drawings »Broken Ground I and II« the artist evokes an overwhelming beauty that is inseparably tied to the fragility of the volcanic landscape. The fragility – the »Uncertain Ground« – is reflected in her works on paper, particularly in the process of drawing itself due to the artist’s use of volcanic ash gathered in the field. Stibbon’s technique is expanded towards a new spiritual dimension by the widespread Hawaiian animistic belief that there is a presence of a soul in the materiality of nature.

Emma Stibbon (born 1962) studied at Portsmouth College of Art, Goldsmith College in London and at the University of the West of England. She is a member of the Royal Academy of Arts in London. Her works are part of numerous public and private collections; the Victoria and Albert Museum, the Stadtmuseum Berlin and the Prussian Palaces and Gardens Foundation Berlin-Brandenburg, amongst others. The artist lives and works in Bristol.