Pippy Houldsworth Gallery is proud to present Floating Between Earth and Sky, the first European solo exhibition of Mexican Surrealist painter and sculptor Sofía Bassi. A contemporary of Leonora Carrington and Remedios Varo, Bassi’s work has been underappreciated outside of her native country. The exhibition brings together paintings, works on paper, and painted ostrich eggs – the first time that this sculptural part of Bassi’s practice has been publicly presented. At the centre of the exhibition is the rare and exceptional altarpiece, Open this door at which I call, sobbing (1970), an iconic example of the artist’s contribution to Surrealism.
Interested in esoteric knowledge and a personal spiritual iconography, Bassi’s paintings exist as windows onto memory, mythology, fear, desire and the vast territories of the subconscious. Flying spirits and castles reside in dreamscapes of fantastical swirling mountain ranges, deserts or seascapes. The motif of the egg holds particular resonance in her practice as a symbol of fertility and rebirth. Bassi saw imagination as a form of freedom: ‘My paintings are portals to other worlds that we can inhabit. Careful observation and meditation of my work will take you to those worlds’.
The exhibition centres on important works from 1968 to 1970, signed ‘ELC’, or En la Cárcel, meaning ‘in prison’. In 1968, Bassi pleaded guilty to the murder of her son-in-law in an incident that remains veiled in uncertainty. Sentenced to ten years in prison in Acapulco, she continued to paint prolifically while incarcerated, producing more than 250 works. Her physical world had contracted, but her inner world remained unbroken: through painting, the mind could travel where the body could not.
Sofía Bassi (b. 1913, Camerino Z. Mendoza, Veracruz, d. 1998, Mexico City) studied Philosophy at The National Autonomous University of Mexico, Mexico City. She began painting in 1964, at the age of 51, and sustained an active painting practice throughout her incarceration, thanks to her family who were able to support Bassi and many of her fellow inmates. Whilst in prison, Bassi painted Space Journey (1969), which was selected for the NASA Hall of Fame and subsequently joined the collection of The Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC. She also collaboratively produced two other murals, now in the collections of the Acapulco Municipal Palace and The National Autonomous University of Mexico, Mexico City. Further collections include Tel Aviv Museum of Art; Museo de Arte Moderno (MAM), Mexico City; Mårbacka Memorial Museum, Stockholm; Museum of Contemporary Art of Bogotá; Museo Kaluz, Mexico City; and FAMM, Mougins.
The exhibition is presented in partnership with La Fundación Sofía Bassi and Georgina Pounds Gallery, Mexico City.