A white, round sculpture resembling a loop lies on a grey, textured floor in a minimalist room. The sculpture's base is irregular, with a small piece breaking the circle's continuity. The walls are plain white, and a dusting of purple glitter is scattered on the floor.

Thea Djordjadze

Possibility, Nansen

Possibility, Nansen presented a new commission by the Cologne-based artist Thea Djordjadze, her first solo exhibition in the United Kingdom. These new works were produced during an on-site residency at Studio Voltaire in partnership with the Goethe Institute, London.

Djordjadze’s working method draws from literature and music as well as art historical references from early Modernism and Surrealism. This is combined with a strong sense of process and an awareness of the potential authority and phenomenology of the art object.

Often working with everyday found materials such as fabric, glass, wood, metal and ceramics, the artist typically makes small to medium-scale organic constructions that combine an almost ‘Beuysian’ shamanistic or ritualistic use of materials with the formalism of early modernist sculptural objects.

Drawing on surrealist juxtapositions of everyday objects and the narrative conceit of a shamanistic presentation of materials, the resulting works are psychologically effective and uncomfortable.

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In collaboration with the Goethe-Institut, London and supported by the Henry Moore Foundation.

  1. Thea Djordjadze (b. 1971, Georgia) lives and works in Cologne. The artist studied under Rosemarie Trockel and has a growing reputation within Europe as an important emerging voice within contemporary sculptural practice. Previous exhibitions and projects include framing yours making mine, Sprüth Magers, London (2024); the ceiling of a courtyard, WIELS, Centre d'Arte Contemporain, Brussels (2023); all building as making, Groupius Bau, Berlin (2021); o potio n, Portikus, Frankfurt (2018); Projects 103: Thea Djordjadze, MoMA PS1, New York (2016); Thea Djordjadze: Ma Sa i a ly e a see, South London Gallery (2015). Djordjadze was also a founding member of the collective hobbypopMUSEUM. The artist is represented by Sprueth Magers, Munich/Cologne/London and Micky Schubert, Berlin.

  2. Thea Djordjadze, Possibility, Nansen, 2007. Installation View, Studio Voltaire, London. Courtesy of the artist and Studio Voltaire, London.