Sophie Berrebi: Jean Dubuffet

In conjunction with the exhibition Jean Dubuffet – The Deep End (July 1, 2017 – Jan 1, 2018) the Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam organizes a gallery talk by writer, art historian, and exhibition curator Dr. Sophie Berrebi (University of Amsterdam). Taking place in the exhibition galleries, Berrebi’s talk guides visitors through a selection of paintings, lithographs, and sculptures by the French artist Jean Dubuffet, all from the Stedelijk Museum collection.

Entitled Jean Dubuffet: The Deep End, the exhibition presents the Stedelijk Museum’s extensive collection of works by the artist. This is the first time Dubuffet’s works from the 1940s and 1950s – in which he experimented with textures and non-art materials – and his works from the 1960s and 1970s – dominated by line drawing – are brought together. Using techniques and disciplines that range from painting to lithography and from assemblage to sculpture, Dubuffet relentlessly questioned the purpose of art. His works seek to disorient viewers and are as much concerned with representing the visible world as with recording impalpable experiences, memories and thoughts. In other words, as Sophie Berrebi argues, Dubuffet’s art can help us think, and think ‘deep’         

MORE ABOUT THE SPEAKER

Dr. Sophie Berrebi is a writer, art historian, and curator, born in Paris and based in Amsterdam. She is, with Margriet Schavemaker, the curator of Jean Dubuffet – The Deep End. She teaches history and theory of modern and contemporary art at the University of Amsterdam and has worked on numerous exhibitions and publications. Berrebi received her PhD on the reception of Dubuffet in the United States from the Courtauld Institute of Art, London, in 2003. Since then, she has published on the work of Jean Dubuffet in various journals, magazines, and books, including Entrée en matière: Hubert Damisch et Jean Dubuffet, Textes et correspondances 1961-2001 (JRP|Ringier / La Maison Rouge, 2016; partially translated in October, issue 154, Winter 2015-16). In June 2018, she will curate the exhibition Jean Dubuffet and the City at Hauser & Wirth, Zürich, and publish a monograph study on Dubuffet and urban space on this occasion.