Melissa Steckbauer - I, the hunter 

Opening 29. Mai 2010 at 6 p.m. 

Duration: 29th of May till 15th of Juli 2010

Gallery Ulf Saupe presents the first solo exhibition in Berlin of the young American artist Melissa Steckbauer. The exhibition “I, the Hunter” showcases a new series of paintings on small paper formats and large canvases. Her paintings touch on intimate, sexually charged moments and fantasies. The opening takes place on the 29th of May 2010 at 6 p.m. in Ulf Saupe Gallery on Torstrasse 75.

Fable characters, people of daily life and exaggerated caricatures find their way into her works.  The artist dramatizes and disarms the situations at the same moment. Through the infantilization of the main characters and through the tenderness in her paintings Steckbauer engages the human need for closeness.

Before the birth of photography, the monopoly on nudeness and vulgarity was in the hand of painters. Catholic censorship banned thousands of paintings and hid them behind closed doors, far away from the eyes of the public. A manifestation to a dark age, which still did not prevent painters from bringing the hidden fantasies and the edge of the human soul onto canvas.

Steckbauer carries on with this tradition into the 21st century. Her paintings leave many questions open that go far beyond the surface of physical nature. In her masterly transition and interpretation of digital photography into painting she succeeds in revealing the reason behind their existence.