Solo exhibition · 20 November – 15 December 2019 · Andakulova Gallery
Emotions: Solo Exhibition at Andakulova Gallery, Dubai
Rima Chahine’s first solo exhibition at Andakulova Gallery in DIFC, Dubai: abstract paintings made by instinct and to music, each one a chapter of her life.
- Category
- Solo exhibition
- Dates
- 20 November – 15 December 2019
- Venue
- Andakulova Gallery
- Location
- DIFC, Dubai
- Published in
- Meer
Emotions was Rima Chahine’s first solo exhibition at Andakulova Gallery in DIFC, Dubai, open from 20 November to 15 December 2019. It brought together paintings that trace her life so far, its highs and its lows, in the richly coloured, gestural abstraction that has become her signature.
It came a year after the Global Art Awards 2018, and in a year that had already taken her work to the Tokyo International Art Fair.
Painted by instinct
Rima paints to music and without preparatory sketches. “Music brings emotions and colours and feelings,” she says, and mood, memory and her surroundings lead the canvas as she works.
A finished painting may look nothing like her first idea, but its meaning is fixed early and runs through it to the end; as she puts it, the end result is always already a finished story. There are no figures in these works. The feeling is carried by colour and by the movement of the brush.
A palette with meaning
Colour is her language, and she uses it deliberately. As she explained to Meer, yellow and orange stand for happiness, red for passion, green for stillness and blue for healing, while black is sadness held together with strength.
Her strokes are fearless, at times aggressive, and impressionistic, and the layered acrylics carry the seasonal, autumn colours of Montreal, where she grew up.
The works
Among the paintings shown were On Fire, Serenity, Zen Garden, Deep Thoughts, Lightning, Volcano Heart, New Earth and Life’s Landscapes. Volcano Heart (2018, 100 × 100 cm) pushes reds up through dark greens; New Earth (2018, 120 × 150 cm) falls in a cascade of greens and yellows.
“I believe in the positive and doing things that uplift you.”
Beyond the canvas
For Rima the work does not end at the easel. She spends time with the people who collect her paintings, helps match each work to its owner and its room, and takes a hand in how it is hung, so that it can be seen at its best. “I create a lifestyle through taste,” she says.
Her approach was also the subject of a feature in Harper’s Bazaar Art, “In Colour and Intuition”.
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