Isabelle Lutz

nana & the technodrastics

acrylic on linen, 200 x 160 cm, 2009.

Pale, dark-eyed figures on striped lines: a girl on skates with a dog, a woman in red, a boy beside an alien, under beams.

A Selection from a Body of 175 Paintings.

A group of women are gathered together; a red line runs across the canvas, obscuring the mouth of one of them; another is dressed like a pope.

Nadja & the jamrolls

acrylic on linen, 110 x 140 cm, 2012.

Lola & the lovefishes

acrylic on linen, 110 x 140 cm, 2012.

A group of women are gathered together; one of them, wearing rabbit ears, is rocking on a seesaw; another is sitting, balancing on a sphere.
A woman's face rendered in fine thread-like lines, taped onto a sheet of paper.

in the slightly acid world

[…] The ambiguity stems from the multiplication of plastic and semantic stimuli, epitomised by the playful and coercive, flashy and disquieting spaces, because it is impossible to settle on a single interpretation here.

Through this reversibility Isabelle Lutz seeks to play with the codes of pop culture, which has abolished dreams of the absolute in favour of a deep relativism whose dominant form is still economic pragmatism. She immerses us in the heart of a postmodernity stripped of exteriority. […]

Fabien danesi, 2009.

A portrait of a woman with large, round buns, adorned with ribbon and flowers, resting her face in her hands.
A portrait of a woman, with a black bob and a long striped roll-neck top, like a giraffe woman, stands out against a background of yellow and black road markings.

When I first faced her works, I was struck by an obvious presence which was not visible in the photographs.

[…] Confusingly, I had the feeling that it was not just about simple “re-presentations”. […] I am forced to imagine the existence of a dialogue to which I am not invited and this felt absence, this “non-destination” that has delegated its representation to what I see [the manifest content] generates in me an alternation of frustration and desire. In other words: interest.

[…] Concerning Isabelle Lutz, I felt that I was dealing with both, a personal desire and also a common property. […] However, it occurred to me that her work was not a singular act seeking a collective dimension, but the opposite — As if the apparent community’s claim, thus displayed, intended to become an essentially individual requirement. […] max torregrossa, 2009.

A group of women and two little girls, dressed in matching striped outfits and wearing antenna-shaped hats, are standing side by side on a blue floor.

stardust & desert dreams

acrylic on linen, 120 x 180 cm, 2010.

a raw portrait of a time shaped by the culture of “fast dream–easy spleen”.

Women dressed in whimsical fancy dress — pink rabbit ears, a striped swimsuit —, one of whom is swinging a yo-yo bearing the image of Bécassine.

cracker’s trade maids

acrylic on linen, 100 x 160 cm, 2012.

penisaholic on Mondays

acrylic on linen, 130 x 160 cm, 2010.

Some women are standing in a room; one of them is holding a placard which reads ‘penisaholic on Mondays’.
A group of women and a little girl are standing together; one is carrying giant rubber ducks, whilst another is wearing an oversized striped skirt shaped like a spinning top.

moonshots & lemon scones

acrylic on linen, 100 x 160 cm, 2012.

nuclear kiss & tattoos of sorrow

acrylic on linen, 130 x 160 cm, 2011.

women are scattered across a striped floor in a dark interior; a disabled dog moves through the space with the help of a wheeled cart.
A group of women are gathered together; one of them is standing on stilts; a couple are kissing; two others are playing with a rubber band.

lilas blue’s endless song

acrylic on linen, 130 x 160 cm, 2010.

rosemarie’s bubble humble

acrylic on linen, 130 x 160 cm, 2011.

A group of women; one is holding balloons that are floating amongst the wind turbines; another is standing on high stilts; a third is holding a plastic bag containing goldfish.
A group of women are standing on a dark floor edged with red; the one in the foreground is wearing a pink blindfold.

Nahla & THE LONG johns

ACRYLIC ON LINEN, 120 X 180 CM, 2012.

daddy’s cherry plums

acrylic on linen, 100 x 160 cm, 2012.

We dwell in reserve, not in sentimentality.

Two women are standing in a corridor with dark stripes, flanked by repeating rows of identical female figures dressed in purple and wearing headphones.

marina & the na-na-na’s

acrylic on linen, 130 x 160 cm, 2010.

mya & the Humpty dumpty’s

acrylic on linen, 130 x 160 cm, 2010.

Two women with horn-shaped headpieces stand on an industrial walkway, dark reddish figures in the distance with earphones.
Pale figures with dark eyes stand in an outdoor space; one of them appears to be dancing beneath a suspended hare sculpture surrounded by totemic figures.

frida & THE joysticks

ACRYLIC ON LINEN, 120 X 180 CM, 2010.

A pencil sketch of a gaunt, wide-eyed nude woman seated, drawn on translucent paper taped to the wall.
A woman crouching on the ground is being restrained by a animal trainer wearing a red clown’s nose; a dog and some children in fancy dress are sitting in front of her.

waiting for my dog [detail] — topsy turvy tale

acrylic on linen, 130 x 160 cm, 2007 — acrylic on linen, 160 x 130 cm, 2010.

A group of women gathered indoor; one is wearing a large, flower-adorned headdress; another a dress with a rooster in relief on the shoulder.

milky brides & crystal queens

acrylic on linen, 130 x 160 cm, 2012.

everything in the work remains underlying to better step forward.

A young girl is kneeling, wearing red boots and carrying a red rucksack, whilst a mouse scurries past; another woman is holding a prisoner’s balloon as it floats through the air.

i’msoku [detail]

acrylic on linen, 130 x 160 cm, 2010.

epileptic rack [detail]

acrylic on linen, 120 x 200 cm, 2010.

Three women in red headphones and red hands stand in a corridor; text on two shirts reads "dear" and "fuck me long".
Sketch-style semi-nude women are standing in a hall before striped colonnades; one is smoking, another sits nearby on steps.

lost in locomotion

ACRYLIC ON LINEN, 120 X 200 CM, 2008.

blandine & the wishbones

acrylic on linen, 130 x 160 cm, 2011.

A woman, wearing a pink dress, is standing in a railway station, surrounded by other women who are waiting, impassive.
Underground-garage interior: semi-nude women posed against columns in the background, a semi-nude woman with raised arm in the foreground beside a little girl in sunglasses and a robe.

sweetie & the hotpatooties

acrylic on linen, 160 x 130 cm, 2009.

organik circus [detail]

acrylic on linen, 130 x 160 cm, 2009.

Painting of two semi-nude women against a grey paneled wall stamped with a numeric code; the taller figure wears a red pendant necklace and a prosthetic leg, the smaller one is partly submerged in a red garment.
A woman in red stripes stands between four ostrich creatures beside the text 'just for a kiss or two'.

Henry lee’s lily-white land [detail]

acrylic on linen, 100 x 160 cm, 2012.

beyond the fantasies — in the heart of a traumatic relationship between Being and city.

[…] Isabelle Lutz’s women haggard and bony testify that within “the filthy city” [Baudelaire] life cannot deny itself. Certainly “there is nothing living which proceeds from nothingness or yearns for it” [St-John Perse] but not everything can fall for nothingness. 

[…] It is perhaps about discovering the fundamental permanence of a consciousness recovered through the mystery of the world, until it returns to itself, to openness, to the origin, to find the justification for existence. […] jean-paul gavard-perret, 2011.

killing me pop

acrylic on linen, 160 x 200 cm, 2009.

Two women inside; one is wearing a headdress shaped like a rooster’s head, the other is holding a doll tied to a string; a monkey, seen from behind, has a target drawn on its bottom.
Some women are waiting in a room; a poem and the words ‘the whore is in the rose’ are written, above a woman lying down; a rabbit is fleeing from a hunter who is chasing it.

ponky’s sugarmen

acrylic on linen, 100 x 160 cm, 2012.

a work of re-composition of thoughts, of thinking immediacies, to clash the human blocks together and to agitate, or at least to clutch every particle of consciousness in each of them. 

Three women wearing helmets with animal ears — animal ears, red antlers, white antlers — are standing in front of an EEG trace.

suicide loop & superstrings

acrylic on linen, 100 x 160 cm, 2012.

her work contains in its very structure a necessary brutality. Initially the artist painted directly with her fingers on large formats. 

[…] But little by little — and no doubt recalling her architectural training — the artist naturally refined her technique. The delicacy of the lines never diminishes the initial brutality. On the contrary, it strengthens it, makes it more violent, incisive.

[…] Such women, by their gaze, look more like icons than psychological portraits. They are somehow the Saints of an atheist universe, soulless. They possess an almost “religious” power of transfiguration. […] jean-paul gavard-perret, 2011.

Expressionist painting in warm orange and red tones: two elongated, stylized faces meeting in a kiss above fused, biomorphic body forms; dark hair frames one figure against a black lower section.

comme un crépuscule ankylosé

acrylic on linen, 160 x 130 cm, 2005.

les triplettes de bellefille

acrylic on linen, 160 x 130 cm, 2005.

Expressionist painting in blue, white and black: three elongated, distorted faces with coral-like red tendrils dripping downward, full pink lips on the leftmost figure, set against a grey ground.
A reddish, big-eyed woman with a grey curly hair halo wears a white robe and smokes a pipe.
A close-up expressionist portrait of a wide-eyed woman in red and yellow tones, dark hair in pigtails.

belle de nuit — saut de puce échaudée[detail]

acrylic on linen, 200 x 120 cm, 2006 — acrylic on linen, 160 x 130 cm, 2006.