We are pleased to announce ‘Wunderkammer’, Zoe Mendelson’s second solo exhibition at SCHLEICHER/LANGE. ‘Wunderkammer’ is the result of Zoe Mendelson’s summer long residency in the gallery and can be considered the artist’s most ambitious site specific project to date. It consists of two exhibitions, one of which is concealed within the other to be revealed upon investigation.

In a first phase the artist conceived a new body of work for exhibition in the gallery, consisting of works on paper, objects and paintings. Mendelson then curated a drawn ‘ghost of the exhibition’ within which to conceal these works. ‘Wunderkammer’ thus became a fictional version of the show drawn directly onto the walls of the gallery as if it were hung - or perhaps grown - in the space. The individual elements of the pencil wall-drawing are functioning as phantoms of the actual ‘physical’ works the artist has prepared for the exhibition. These permanent works will remain - metaphorically and physically - in the background, only visible on exploration, thus challenging the viewer to imagine what is real and what is fictitious; what is archival and what is temporal.

The title of the exhibition refers to the cabinets of curiosities, dating from the 17th century, which were collections of artifacts kept by many early practitioners of science and anthropology in Europe, and were early precursors to the museum. The wunderkammer were often extremely personal - and somewhat false - histories in that in many cases there was not much critical taxonomy employed and fictitious objects were included amongst the real artifacts. Mendelson’s Wunderkammer is a questionably illusory collection or show, its intimacy throwing up questions about display and the personal.

For Zoe Mendelson temporality is an important part in the creation of site-specific works: Comparing the process to ‘building elaborate sandcastles speedily before a high tide’, it becomes almost performative to her. Freed from the drawings’ longevity, she is content to leave them behind once the making is over. Consequently the wall pieces will be destroyed after the three month exhibition period, leaving the objects and other permanent works behind as a physical reminder of what was their own archive.

Borne out of contemporary fantasies, Mendelson’s drawn, intricate dreamscapes embody dislocated narratives with conflicting roots in children’s illustration, botanical and erotic drawing that play off intimations of desire with sensations of disgust and discomfort. Her hollowed out drawings of female characters, whose poses and expressions are lifted from the mechanical repertoire of adult entertainment, are combined with lavish, embellished flora and fauna that sit within theatrical architectural and horticultural settings.

The emptiness of the drawn girls allows a fantastical internal world to leak out. This internal world threatens to take over its female characters entirely; the figures become entangled and hidden, or begin to morph into their own environments. Through these embellished worlds, the artist manipulates an idealised romance and gentility and employs their codes as a cover for erotic excess, allowing the work to expose itself as politely soiled. Using imagery that is heavily inspired by obsession and dreams, as well as secret desire, Mendelson plays with our collective subconscious: Although elements look, at first sight, to be familiar, we nevertheless fail to establish their origin, leaving us intrigued and puzzled at the same time.