Etel Adnan

Opening Thursday, January 6, 2022, 10:00am to 6:00pm

Galerie Lelong & Co., New York and Paris, are pleased to present Discovery of Immediacy, a solo exhibition of the late artist’s recent work that will encompass both gallery locations. The exhibition will present new paintings and leporellos, completed in the past year before Adnan passed away on November 14, 2021.

When Adnan participated in Documenta 13 (2012) at the age of 87, she quickly drew acclaim as a master colorist, becoming known for her harmonious abstract landscapes. In 2021, the artist completely stripped her works of saturated color in her new oil on canvas series Discovery of Immediacy, using black and white as the primary colors. The works reference the practice of traditional ink painting that rely exclusively on black—and its many gradations through the artist’s hand—to distinguish each stroke from another; hints of color remain, recalling Adnan’s oeuvre. The confinement of the pandemic had directed Adnan back to nature—leading to the artist’s deep observation of the sky and planets—a pleasure she denotes in her intimate canvases.

A new series of leporellos will be presented. They are named after Erquy, a small commune in Brittany, northwestern France where Adnan and her longtime partner Simone Fattal had spent their summers. In 2021, they were interviewed by Hans Ulrich Obrist from their seaside apartment, with Adnan remarking how the commune is a straight line on the sea from her window. Fattal, in response, had shared how Adnan was so “impregnated by this straight line” that she would make a leporello each day, looking at the rocks, trees, surfers, and other people on the beach.