Join us on VOLTA Visits, a recurring series where we spend studio time with VOLTA exhibiting artists and learn more about their background, process, and projects.

Entering Marion Boehm’s studio in the attic of her family’s home is a multi-sensory experience. The colorful fabrics and textiles immediately grab your attention as her full-size artworks cover the walls, spreading the scent of the process of their formation.

Marion creates life-size collages. The center of attention is a portrait, typically of one person, but sometimes a group of two or three, based on a photograph or from her imagination. One can easily get lost in the myriad layers of textiles, colorful fabrics, appliqués, pearls, and patterns with countless details to discover drawing the viewer deeper into the narrative of the work.

Marion moved from works on paper to canvas as a surface. She collects materials from all over the world: Europe, Africa, Asia, and from different cultures and decades. She reutilizes traditional costumes, dresses, tablecloths, embroidery and rearranges each of them with their own history into a new context. Textiles of traditional African clothes are placed next to a knitted carpet from Germany in the 50s. Marion interweaves potential contrasts into new connections. She preserves history while transforming it into a new environment.

Having been interested in cultural exchange since childhood, Marion travelled the world as a flight attendant before working as an Interior Designer. In 2010, she moved to Johannesburg, South Africa, teaching art at a children‘s school, and traveling to the Soweto township, which had a massive influence on her work. South African artist Kay Hassan became her mentor and introduced her to a private community project in Kliptown.

Marion examines the relationships between African, Asian, and Western cultures from past to present. She constantly questions history in relation to current events. Nomadism and racism are recurring themes in her work. With children and women being her primary subject-matter, she draws attention to disproportions in society, which subtly unfold under the surface. The statements, of her own or taken from poems, are printed onto the faces of her characters, in either English or Arabic. The text repeats itself, decoding the works’ intention while leaving space for the observer’s self-reflection and own interpretation.

“Nomadic lifestyle has always been confronted with settled lifestyles.”

In her most recent series presented at VOLTA Basel, Marion references the Chinese exploitation of natural resources in Africa. Her works uncover how Chinese and African realities are interwoven, yet in contrast with one another. In a former series of her work, she examines the roots of racism by incorporating western children’s toys into her practice. Combining her own childhood memories with her outside perspective on Africa’s living environment, sensitively reveals past and current circumstances and offers a platform for an open dialogue.

Marion Boehm is presented by OOA Gallery in Barcelona and London. The gallery introduces her with a solo presentation at VOLTA Basel in June.

MARION BOEHM
Born 1964 in Duisburg, Germany
Lives and works in Germany

Education

1997 Diploma of Interior Design at University FH, Darmstadt, Germany
1998-2010 Independent Interior Architect in Frankfurt, Cannes, and Milan
2011-2014 Community Centre work at Bolo’s Kliptown Johannesburg, South Africa

Recent Exhibitions (selection)

2022 Art Dubai, Loft Art Gallery, Casablanca
2021 Welcome to Look at Me*, Loft Art Gallery, Casablanca
2021 Art Madrid, OOA Gallery, Barcelona
2020 Embrace*, OOA Gallery, Barcelona
2020 1-54 Contemporary Art Fair, New York, OOA Gallery, Barcelona
2020 Cape Town Art Fair, Cape Town
2019 Art Paris Art Fair
2019 Expo Chicago
2019 Filam(a)nt Exhibition, Fondation Blachère, Apt, France
2019 Spaces in Between, This is Not a White Cube Gallery, Lisbon
2018 1-54 Contemporary Art Fair, London
2018 Black Paris*, Art Paris Art Fair
2018 Stiches*, Art Paris Art Fair

*solo shows