Press

Rosie Lesso speaks to artist Lucy Skaer, who has curated Le femme de nulle part

Rosie Lesso: What does the title of the show refer to?

Lucy Skaer: It translates as ‘The woman from nowhere’. It’s the title of a 1922 silent film by Louis Delluc, in which a woman from nowhere arrives at the homes she had abandoned years earlier, instigating an eventually failed rebellion by the lady of the house. The works in the show investigate the manufacture of histories, and their possible overthrow.

RL: How have you found the experience of curating the work of others?

LS: I think I put the work together in quite a similar way to my own art practice, making intuitive combinations of work and using them to reveal ideas and themes, rather than the other way around.

RL: Do their ideas or the ideas behind this exhibition relate to your practice?

LS: Not in a direct sense. The works in the exhibition allow me to think through different routes and perspectives, rather than my own familiar ones.

RL: Who will be exhibiting in the space?

LS: There are three artists in the show: Anita Di Bianco, Sophie Macpherson and Rosalind Nashashibi. They are artists that I know very well, and that I have worked with before (Hanneline Visnes and I act in Anita’s film ‘Disaffection and Disaffectation’ and I collaborate with Rosalind).

RL: How will you use the space at Doggerfisher?

LS: The use of the gallery space is central to the way I have been thinking about the show. The gallery is divided, so that visitors have to pass through a dark space where Anita’s film is shown to get into the rest of the gallery. I want the installation of the work to be quite confrontational. Both Anita and Sophie are making new works, and Sophie will be responding to the space by making a new installation.