Franziska Furter

21 March until 17 May 2025

Opening: Thursday, 20 March 2025, 5 to 8pm

We are delighted to present new works by Franziska Furter (*1972 in Zurich, lives and works in Basel) in her seventh solo exhibition at our gallery. Her show begins with a light: In a large two-sided wall drawing titled Now and Now, Franziska Furter depicts a burning sparkler. She captures this fleeting, momentary visual phenomenon for the duration of the exhibition. On one side, the white wall transforms into a luminous body through black pigment, radiating the essence of an instant. On the reverse side, the wall drawing continues—an inversion of the spectacle, a black light on a white background. Both depictions are based on the same photograph, presenting the same moment once in positive and once in negative. The work explores questions of perspective and the perception of reality and illusion, truth and invention. For Franziska Furter, the sparkler embodies the passage of time—everything is over in a matter of seconds. As a child, she was always surprised that after such a bright spectacle, only a black, crumbling stick remained. She had long wanted to find a new form for this image, and now the time was right.

The passage of time has always played a significant role in Franziska Furter’s art. Her craftsmanship and physical engagement with her materials are central to her practice. In this sense, her drawing can be seen as akin to sculpture. The tactile aspect, the deep focus on her work, is essential to her and becomes visible in each of her pieces. This almost physical concentration on the artistic expression is also evident in the 14 small-format works on paper titled A Grain of Sand, arranged around the two wall drawings. Franziska Furter pays particular attention to the presentation of these works: the sheets appear to float within their frames, giving them an effortless lightness. Some of the marbled, abstract compositions can be interpreted as landscapes, as they contain horizon lines. Other associations also emerge—infrared images of weather phenomena, microscopic views, maps, and more. Since 2010, Franziska Furter has been working and experimenting with the marbling technique, which has manifested in various series, including Coronas (2012–14), Scattered Rainbows (2014–19), and Remains of the Day (2021). All these works originated on the surface of the water and were constantly in motion until Franziska Furter captured them on paper. They are, therefore, imprints of a moment—just a second later, they would have looked entirely different.

In the second exhibition space, striking red knots from the Fundas series set bold accents. These works are inspired by lucky charms and slings, which Franziska Furter first encountered in their Spanish form, Honderas, during a study stay in Mallorca. Funda means “sling” in the Romansh language. They serve both as a visualization of anger and protest and as a meditation on focus and contemplation. Knots hold great symbolic power in many cultures, representing love, connection, eternity, continuity, destiny, and more.