Published by White Cube. Edited by Honey Luard. Text by Katy Siegel.
Known for paintings that oscillate nimbly between abstraction and figuration, Magnus Plessen (born 1967) focuses here on rotation as a means of reordering the relation of the viewer to the painting. These latest works simultaneously feature figurative elements that are ostensibly recognizable--hands, heads, feet--combined with abstract passages that serve to restructure order and dimensionality within the painting. This effect is reinforced by a deliberate illogicality; representational aspects of body parts are fragmented and disembodied, elusive and transitory, unbound by any particular viewpoint or frame of reference. Riding the Image surveys this development in Plessen’s art.
Published by DuMont. Edited by Uta Grosenick, Daniel Marzona. Text by Rainer Fuchs, Eva Meyer-Hermann.
Teetering on the brink of compositional unity, the paintings of Magnus Plessen (born 1967) veer deftly between their material application and figuration, in scraped, blocky strokes, so that the image appears to have labored its way, with a physical effort, onto the surface of the canvas. This new monograph collects all 100 of his paintings to date, done since his transition to painting from photography.
Magnus Plessen