- Source: Bettina Sellmann
Bettina Sellmann (born 1971) is a German artist.
From 1992 to 1997 Sellmann studied and graduated as Meisterschülerin (Master) at Städelschule Frankfurt. In 1999 she was awarded a DAAD grant for New York City, where she lived and worked until 2009. She currently lives and works in Berlin, Germany. Sellmann also holds a Master of Fine Arts degree from Hunter College, NYC.
In her paintings Sellmann uses a watercolor-on-canvas technique in "candy colored acrylic tones (bonbonbunte Acryltöne)" and “multi-layers of translucent pigments in pale pinks, powder blues, and acidic yellows and greens“.
Works of her have been described as “see-through versions of Old Master paintings ... gone translucent and ethereal“, "particular reverie-inducers“, exploring “the other side of pink“.
Recent paintings deal with kidult and fairy tale "romanticism“ (Cassandra Neyenesch) as well as kawaii imagery and influences of Far Eastern spirituality.
At Wonderloch Kellerland Berlin in 2011 she performed a space clearing, which could be considered either an empty room or "a purely transcendent exhibition“.
She has works in private and public collections, such as the Museum of Modern Art, New York, which holds her drawing The Saints in This World Are Watching (2003).
Awards
DAAD (German Academic Exchange Service) - Grant
Skowhegan Summer Residency Program
Exhibitions
= Solo exhibitions
=2021 Easymagic123 (with Julia Jansen, poetry reading by Julia Mantel), Kunstverein Offenbach, Germany
2020 Easymagic123 (with Julia Jansen), Baustelle Schaustelle Düsseldorf and Essen, Germany
2019 Glam magic manufactoray (with René Luckhardt), Oberfinanzdirektion, Frankfurt/Main, Germany
2018 Dia-Ikone (with René Luckhardt), Weißfrauen Diakoniekirche, Frankfurt/Main, Germany
2017 Hello Color, Gilla Lörcher I Contemporary Art, Berlin, Germany
2016 It's already there, Gilla Lörcher I Contemporary Art, Berlin, Germany
2015 US Paintings, Gilla Lörcher I Contemporary Art, Berlin, Germany
2015 Spiral, Square and Dickie-Bow, Wolfstädter Galerie, Frankfurt, Germany
2013 To Queen Luise & Young-Wilhelm, Wonderloch Kellerland, Berlin, Germany
2013 Magic Every Day, Gilla Lörcher I Contemporary Art, Berlin, Germany
2011 Bettina Sellmann @ Kaisersaal, ISI/Potsdamer Platz, Berlin, Germany
2011 Templeloch Space Clearing, Wonderloch Kellerland, Berlin, Germany
2009 Taina, cosmogeny, make your own paper dragon, Derek Eller Gallery, New York, NY, USA
2007 Galerie Frank Schlag, Essen, Germany
2006 Derek Eller Gallery, New York, NY, USA
2004 Armor & Etiquette, Derek Eller Gallery, New York, NY, USA
2004 Drawings, Derek Eller Gallery, New York, NY, USA
= Group exhibitions
=2023 PORTRAIT I, Galerie Tammen, Berlin, Germany
2023 FOYOU 7, Marienburg, Berlin, Germany
2023 MISSTORY, Kunstverein Familie Montez, Frankfurt/Main, Germany
2023 Alptraum at Polarraum, Hamburg, Germany
2022 Hypnopomp, Hilbertraum, Berlin, Germany
2022 außer sich, inner ich, Inselgalerie Berlin, Germany
2022 WAN(N) DA, Galerie Greulich, Frankfurt/Main, Germany
2022 Essence of Color – Blue, Städtische Galerie im Leeren Beutel, Regensburg, Germany
2022 Kick Line, Thaler Originalgrafik, Leipzig, Germany
2022 North Oversee, Kunsthalle Wilhelmshaven, Germany
2021 100 unter 1000, Schindler LAB, Potsdam, Germany
2021 Popup Pickup, Works by 180 international artists on magnets, Lübeck, Germany
2021 Stubenausstellung, Kunstraum Dietz, Cologne, Germany
2020 Sweet Nothing Sweet, Kunstverein KISS, Abtsgmünd-Untergröningen, Germany
2020 (No)body is perfect, Galerie 21.06, Ravensburg, Germany
2020 Alptraum, TAM Torrance Art Museum, California, USA
2019 Voix, Museum of Fine Arts (MdbK), Leipzig, Germany
2019 Paint: The Seen, the Unseen and the Imagined, Messums Wiltshire, Tisbury, UK
2019 Alptraum, La Estacion Gallery, Chihuahua, Mexico
2018 AIM Project, Parallel Art Fair Vienna, Austria
2018 Die Jahrhundert-Bar, Projektraum Ventilator, Berlin, Germany
2018 8 Frauen, Galerie 21.06, Ravensburg, Germany
2018 Zündung, Turps Gallery, London, UK
2018 Das Schöne Zimmer, Alexander Ochs Private, Berlin, Germany
2018 Painting XXL, Galerie Leuenroth, Frankfurt/Main, Germany
2018 Diaikone, Weißfrauenkirche, Frankfurt am Main, Germany
2016 Animalism, Galerie Bernd Kugler, Innsbruck, Austria
2016 Blanke Teile, Malerinnennetzwerk Berlin-Leipzig, Schaufenster, Berlin, Germany
2015 1. Berlin Edition, Salon Dahlmann, Berlin, Germany
2014 Die Leipziger Edition, Wiensowski & Harbord, Berlin, Germany
2014 Painting Was A Lady, Wonderloch Kellerland, New York City, USA
2013 Berlin–Klondyke, Spinnerei Leipzig, Germany
2012 Everywhere and Nowhere, Works from the Collection Reydan Weiss - Kunsthaus Villa Jauss, Oberstdorf, Germany
2012 Alptraum, Green Papaya Art Project, Metropolitan Museum of Manila, Manila, Philippines
2012 Painting Was A Lady, Vienna Art Foundation, Kunstraum am Schauplatz, Vienna, Austria
2011 Soiree Matinee, Wonderloch Kellerland, Los Angeles, USA
2010 Talk Show, Edward Thorp Gallery, New York, NY, USA
2009 Drawn, Kinkead Contemporary, Los Angeles, CA, USA
2009 Figuratively Seeing, Massachusetts College of Art and Design, Boston, MA, USA
2009 Tales of Wonder and Woe, Castle Gallery, New Rochelle, NY, USA
2008 The Golden Record, The Collective Gallery, Edinburgh, UK
2006 Flicker, University Art Museum, Albany, NY, USA
2005 Hello Sunday, Sixtyseven/Thierry Goldberg Gallery, New York, NY, USA
2004 Under the Sun, Greener Pastures Gallery, Toronto, Canada
2003 Girls Gone Wild, Bronwyn Keenan Gallery, New York, NY, USA
2002 Fredericks Freiser Gallery, New York, NY, USA
2001 Groupshow, American Fine Arts, New York, NY, USA
References
Museum of Modern Art / New York
Skowhegan Art Registry
MassArt Massachusetts College of Art and Design
Wonderloch Kellerland Berlin
Further reading
New American Paintings, #74, Volume 13, Issue 1, The Open Studio Press, USA, February/March 2008
ISSN 1066-2235
Remastered, Sebastien Agneessens (Ed.), Die Gestalten Verlag, Berlin 2006
ISBN 978-389955164-8
Bettina Sellmann, Galerie Kollmeier Essen (Werden), 2003 ISBN 3-00-012691-0
Susan M. Canning, Tales of Wonder and Woe, Castle Gallery, New Rochelle, NY, USA, December 2008
Roberta Smith, Girls Gone Wild, The New York Times, Art in Review, NYC, USA, July 4, 2003, page B-29
Notes
External links
Artist's website
ArtFacts.net information on Bettina Sellmann