On View: Pauline d’Andigné and Sophie Ullrich at Piero Atchugarry

Installation view Melting Point by Pauline d’Andigné at Piero Atchugarry, Miami.
Photo credit Erin Parish.

The art gallery Piero Atchugarry, located in Little Haiti, oftentimes has more than the customary single exhibition simultaneously in the 9000 square foot exhibition space. Currently two of its shows display an artist’s paintings alongside their sculptures. Through this pairing, the viewer gets a keener insight into the minds of both the artists and how they revisit imagery in both media. Pauline d’Andigné’s ‘Melting Point’ and Sophie Ullrich’s ‘All Sauce No Shrimp’ create dialogues between their paintings and their sculptures with repeated imagery.

Sophie Ullrich, Gators gate, 2024, Oil on canvas, 59 x 78 ½ inches.
Photo credit Erin Parish.

Swiss artist Sophie Ullrich lives and works in Düsseldorf, a major European contemporary art center. She has a repertoire of motifs; simplified graphics, vintage advertisements, and a reoccurring line drawing of a headless figure, childlike in its simplicity, which reads like her avatar. These images are layered and juxtaposed with abstract expressionist moments that hint at a deeper sophistication. To further contrast and separate the elements in her paintings, Ullrich employs illusionism amongst her tools at times.

Sophie Ullrich, Tropical Sidewalk, 2023, Oil on canvas, 94.5 x 75 inches. Photo credit Erin Parish.

The paintings were made to relate to the gallery site specifically, hence alligators, palms, and a heron. Does she anticipate a local cuisine of hot sauce and kimchi, soy sauce, and shrimp cocktail, as presented in her work? Interestingly, she is spot on in the land of Disney, incorporating Sea Monkey’s into the mix with artifice being a frequent element in Miami culture.

Sophie Ullrich, HD-TV, 2024; Oil on canvas, 59 x 78 ½ inches. Photo credit Erin Parish.

Her flat, graphic renditions of labels and ads evoke a Warholian aesthetic. The sophistication of her abstract underpainting contrasts with the simple line drawings, creating a dynamic tension within each piece. Add photorealist imagery floating in a color space and much of the 20th centuries art movements are addressed in this work.

Sophie Ullrich, from left to right,
Godzilla, 2024, Engraved Glass bowl, height 9 1/2 inches
Crab, 2024, Engraved Glass bowl, height 9 1/2 inches
Eyes, 2024, Etched Glass bowl, height 9 1/2 inches
Plants, 2024, Etched glass bowl, height 9 1/2 inches
Algae, 2024, Etched Glass bowl, height 9 1/2 inches
Photo credit Erin Parish.

Ullrich’s sculptures, though visually linked to her paintings through motifs etched in glass and their coloration, are less immediately engaging. The vessels have sea-themed etchings and varying green hues. Once we learn of her childhood spent among science beakers with her biologist mother, the meaningfulness to the artist starts to take shape.

Pauline d’Andigné; Large Doodle on Yellow Strip, 2023, oil pastel and silkscreen on bleached canvas; 55.1 x 74.8 inches. Photo credit Erin Parish.

Pauline d’Andigné’s ‘Melting Point’ consists of modestly sized black vinyl flowers hanging from the ceiling on utilitarian steel chains and abstract paintings. Some of the flowers appear to be melting, indicating a temporality of the life of the flower, a shift from solid to liquid, hence the title of the show. The shape is reminiscent of the Mary Quant logo, who had a heyday during the London’s swinging sixties, or those that children draw.

Pauline d’Andigné, Yellow Flowers on Blue and Silver, 2023; Oil pastel and silkscreen on bleached canvas; 55.1 x 74.8 inches. Photo credit Erin Parish.

The flower reoccurs in d’Andigné’s paintings in a variety of loopy scales. At their largest, as with Big Flowers on Yellow Grid, they initially recall the paintings of Robert Motherwell, however the forms depart from Motherwell’s work as they are screen-printed, and thus, not intuitively made directly on the canvas. She uses printmaking atop bleached canvas and then goes back into the image with oil pastels. According to the gallery press release, she aims to convey themes of “rebellion, vulnerability, impermanence, and loss of innocence.”

Pauline d’Andigné, Big Flowers on Yellow Grid, 2023; oil pastel and silkscreen on bleached canvas; 55.1 x 74.8 inches. Photo credit Erin Parish.

d’Andigné lives and works in Paris.

Both artists use a simplified object form and mono-coloration for their sculptures. The paintings are more nuanced and complex and seem like their primary media. The materialism d’Andigné’s black vinyl and Ullrich’s oversized beakers are the subject matter from which to extrapolate meaning. The paintings, while having nominal painterliness, are not only about the materiality of the paint. The paintings of both artists are layered yet thin and intellectually conversant with the history of art. They have a combination of a sophistication with loose, confident paint handling.

WHAT: Pauline d’Andigné: Melting Point and Sophie Ullrich: All Sauce No Shrimp
WHERE: Piero Atchugarry, 5520 NE 4th Avenue, Miami
WHEN: 1 to p.m. –5 p.m. Tuesday to Saturday
COST: Free
INFORMATION: pieroatchugarry.com, info@pieroatchugarry.com, 305.639.8247

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