VIVIANE SASSEN

Orlando, McEvoy Foundation for the Arts, San Francisco, USA, 7 February 2020 - 2 May 2020

Orlando - guest curated by Tilda Swinton and organized by Aperture, New York- draws upon the themes of Virginia Woolf’s seminal novel to celebrate openness, curiosity, and human possibility.

photo: Henrik Kam

Body Performance, Helmut Newton Foundation Museum für Fotografie, Berlin, Germany, 30 November 2019 - 10 May 2020

In the Helmut Newton Stiftung in the Museum für Fotografie in Berlin the exhibition "Body Performance" presents works by Vanessa Beecroft, Yang Fudong, Inez & Vinoodh, Jürgen Klauke, Robert Longo, Robert Mapplethorpe, Helmut Newton, Barbara Probst, Viviane Sassen, Bernd Uhlig, and Erwin Wurm.

Group Show: Moshekwa Langa, Viviane Sassen, and Portia Zvavahera, Andrew Kreps Gallery, 55 Walker, New York, USA, 25 October 2019 - 21 December 2019

For the exhibition, the galleries have selected three artists from Stevenson’s program, Langa, Sassen, and Zvavahera, whose distinct practices are united by explorations of memory, the subconscious, and spirituality. This exhibition is Andrew Kreps Gallery’s first at 55 Walker, an exhibition space jointly operated by Bortolami, kaufmann repetto, and Andrew Kreps Gallery.

Hot Mirror, Stevenson Gallery, Amsterdam, The Netherlands, 18 September 2019 - 16 October 2019

Inspired by the work of British photographer Lee Miller, Sassen embarks on a search for surrealism in her own work. This installation - which combines Sassen’s more well known pieces as well as new digital collage colourings - continuously get the spectator on the wrong foot. Hot Mirror is Sassen’s first gallery exhibition since 2011 and a first ever installation at Stevenson Gallery Amsterdam.

Visible / Invisible, Grand Trianon / Palace of Versailles, Versailles, France, 14 May 2019 - 20 October 2019

Taking inspiration from the crowd, artworks have filled the rooms of this estate for centuries. Myriads and materials from which Versailles was built. For the first time - Château des Versailles - has commissioned artists to produce new works. In this instance, images condense and pare down thoughts on this elusive place.

Viviane Sassen splashes colour-soaked images throughout the rooms of the Grand Trianon. Through her studious examination of Versailles’s statuaries and the history of the palace and its occupants; she projects a haunting narrative of contemporary femininity - then and now.

Hot Mirror, Prestel, 2018, Hardcover, Paperback with Jacket, 24x33cm, 95 color illustrations, 9 b/w illustrations, 160 pages

This mid-career retrospective volume focuses on Viviane Sassen’s fine art photography, revealing a surrealist undercurrent in her work.

Selected by Sassen herself from across the last ten years, the images draw on the surrealist strategies of collage and unexpected juxtapositions to give a survey of her practice.

Heliotrope, TBW, 2018, Cloth-bound hard cover with tip-on covers, 27.9 x 22.2cm, 84 pages

A clear departure from Sassen's previous book works, Heliotrope alludes to a photographic future with endless technical possibilities for a medium still in its infancy. The ordinary and the magical merge. The series is underpinned by the impulse to explore unknown territories, physical or metaphorical.

Hot Mirror, The Hepworth Wakefield, Wakefield, UK, 22 June 2018 - 7 October 2018

'Vault' shown at Stevenson Gallery booth, Art Basel, Basel, Switzerland, 14 June 2018 - 17 June 2018

photo: Stevenson Gallery

Of Mud and Lotus, Stevenson Gallery, Johannesburg, South Africa, 12 April 2018 - 19 May 2018

Roxane II, Stevenson Gallery, Cape Town, South Africa, 30 November 2017 - 13 January 2018

'In this photographic series, Sassen and her muse Roxane Danset continue writing the shared visual journal they began in 2012. In an introductory poem, Maria Barnas captures the spirit of the work as she writes: ‘When I take a glance at our selves I hold my breath and see us expand in colours and clouds bursting from a mouth. Are they yours or mine?’'

Of Mud and Lotus, G/P Gallery, Tokyo, Japan, 6 October 2017 - 25 November 2017

Roxane II, 2017

At times sensual, at times tender, these images are equally about the performances in front of and behind the camera. Sassen’s presence is perceived through her shadow and made tangible by scraps of paper that bear the imprint of her breasts. The images are a mutual portrait - an exchange in which the artist’s and model’s individualities blur, leaving traces on each other.

Of Mud and Lotus, 2017

Experimenting with collages and unique hand-coloured pieces, Sassen creates images in which abstraction and performance intertwine.

Of Mud and Lotus, Artbeat Publishers, 2017, Binding, Hard cover with embroidery, 23.2 x 28.7 x 1.2cm, 108 pages

Of Mud and Lotus is Viviane Sassen's second collaboration with Japanese collective artbeat publishers and G/P Gallery, Tokyo. As the title suggests, this body of work engages in a conversation on transformation, procreation and fecundity, all elements traditionally ascribed to the idea of the feminine.

Heliotrope, 2017

Roxane II, oodee, 2017, Screen printed hardcover, 23 x 24.5cm, 152 pages

In Roxane II, Viviane Sassen and her muse Roxane continue writing their shared visual journal. Sassen’s presence is perceived through her shadow and made tangible by scraps of paper that bear the imprint of her breasts. This is a mutual portrait, an exchange in which the artist’s and model’s individualities blur, leaving traces on each other.

UMBRA, Museum of Contemporay Photogrpahy, Chicago, US, 20 January 2017 - 1 April 2017

Exchange, Hans Mayer Gallery, Dusseldorf, Germany, 15 October 2016 - 15 November 2016

Cause the grass don't grow and the sky ain't blue, Praz Delavallade, Paris, France, 7 July 2015 - 24 September 2015

'This show brings together artists who call into question those systems that in art organize a hierarchy of materials and urban zones. These artists have set up their studios in the suburbs, by choice or for financial concerns, and their surroundings are often at the very core of their artistic practice.'

When I Give Myself, van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam, Netherlands, 20 May 2015 - 17 January 2016

UMBRA, Deutsche Börse, Frankfurt, Germany, 17 April 2015 - 7 June 2015

'The winners of the annual Deutsche Börse Photography Prize were announced on 28 May 2015: Mikhael Subotzky & Patrick Waterhouse. Other photographers, who were shortlisted for this year’s prize, were: Nikolai Bakharev, Zanele Muholi and Viviane Sassen.'

UMBRA (Prestel), Prestel, 2015, Softcover, 192 pages

Viviane Sassen's latest book is her second to focus on the Umbra series and its exploration of the multifarious roles of the shadow in her work.

Sketches, Kominek Books, 2015, Offset print, 36 pages

Sketches shows Polaroids made in Africa between 2002 and 2010. This book could be an explanation or a introducion to the previous Flamboya book and project but in fact Sketches is a small and magic book on its own, showing the beautiful universe of Viviane Sassens photography.

Lexicon, Artbeat Publishers, 2014, Hardcover, 72 pages

Viviane's first photo book in Japan, "LEXICON" includes the series by the same title which was chosen by Massimiliano Gioni to be part of The Encyclopedic Palace at the 55th Venice Biennale (2013). The thirty-one images, encompassing iconic and more recent ones, wove together the themes recurring in her work: death, mourning, the fear of being alone and the longing for an emotional connection. The profound sensitivity behind the vivid images is enhanced by a delicate book design and the use of special Japanese paper.

Pikin Slee, 2014

Pikin Slee is the second-largest village on the Upper Suriname River, deep within the rainforest of Suriname. Its 4000 inhabitants are mostly members of the Saramacca tribe, their ancestors Maroons who escaped slavery on the Dutch plantations in the 18th century.

Etan & Me, 2014

This is me, looking at you, looking at me. This is you, looking at me, looking at you.

Etan & Me is a story of love and loss, of Eros and Thanatos.

UMBRA, 2014

Sassen leads us through a series of imaginative takes on the idea of the shadow as a metaphor for the anxiety and desire, memories and expectations, imagination and illusion that manifest in the human psyche.

Pikin Slee, Prestel, 2014, Hardcover, 144 pages

The Saramacca are isolated from the outside world, living without running water, electricity, roads or the internet. The only way to access the village is by canoe, a journey of about three hours up-river. They grow their food on small agricultural plots, producing cassava bread, pressed maripa palm oil and dried coconut.

UMBRA (odee), oodee, 2014, Folder (foil block cover), 28 pages

Viviane Sassen's photographic series Umbra, titled after the Latin word for shadow, was commissioned by the Nederlands Fotomuseum. A mysterious quality is cast on the seemingly everyday objects and situations portrayed.

Lexicon, City Gallery, Wellington, New Zealand, 22 March 2014 - 5 June 2014

'Sassen’s iconic but enigmatic images play on our expectations to wrong foot us. They are a strange alloy of the documentary and the directorial: some of her subjects look found, others staged. She shows us how people in other places live, the colours and textures of their environment, yet her images are also riddled with formal conceits. Some emphasise the vivid and vital, others feature coffins, body bags, and graves. On the one hand, they seem exotic, otherworldly, a bit National Geographic; on the other, her subjects are well dressed and urbane, cosmopolitan. Her views are never one thing or the other.'

UMBRA, Nederlands Fotomuseum, Rotterdam, Netherlands, 8 March 2014 - 1 June 2014

Etan & Me, oodee, 2013, Hardcover, 72 pages

Etan & Me is a story of love and loss, of Eros and Thanatos, the exploration of the Self and the Other. Are we ever able to truly know someone, to truly know ourselves?

In and out of Fashion, Prestel, 2013, Hardcover, 250 pages

Sassens intuitive and imaginative style can be flamboyant, contemplative, erotic, and surreal, often simultaneously. This volume includes essays that offer a context for Sassens work in the history of fashion photography as well as a bibliography of nearly all of her fashion series. The book will be a delight for Sassens many fans and those eager for inspiration or beautiful escape.

Roxane, oodee, 2012, Hardcover, 76 pages

Roxane is a visual journal in time by photographer Viviane Sassen. Roxane's body and expressions follow the artist's direction in a sequence of poses and moods collected over a number of years.

Die Son Sien Alles, Libraryman, 2012, Hardcover, 40 pages

Viviane Sassen photographed the series Die Son Sien Alles in the townships of Cape Town during several visits between 2002 and 2004, looking at the interior decoration of people's homes, shops and bars.

Parasomnia, 2007 - 2011

Parasomnia animates these feelings of dislocation between home and away, night and day, life and dreams. The series comprises photographs taken in West and East Africa over the past two years, as well as a few taken in Europe, which frame her enigmatic and often haunting narratives.

Parasomnia, Prestel, 2011, Hardcover, 104 pages

In medical terminology, 'parasomnia' denotes various sleep dysfunctions, such as somnambulism. Viviane Sassen's photographs evoke the sense of displacement and ambiguity often experienced in the state between waking and sleep.

Prefaced by a short story written by Moses Isegawa, the pages of the book lead the eye through a series of illusions on the verge of realism.

Parasomnia, Motive Gallery, Amsterdam, Netherlands, 12 March 2011 - 29 April 2011

Moshi, Stevenson Gallery, Cape Town, South Africa, 2 December 2010 - 15 January 2011

Sol & Luna, Libraryman Co., Ltd., 2009, Hardcover, b/w offset, 32 pages

On assignment and initiative from Stockholm based men’s clothier Our Legacy and publisher Libraryman Co., Ltd. – photographer Viviane Sassen (b.1972 Dutch) has completed a specially made and well-built series of imagery with androgyny and beauty as the key principle.

Flamboya, FOAM, Amsterdam, Netherlands, 21 November 2008 - 18 January 2009

Foam presents an extensive survey of recent photos taken by Viviane Sassen while travelling through various parts of Africa.

Flamboya, 2004 - 2008

Flamboya includes primarily portraits that Sassen made collaboratively with her subjects, some spontaneous and others performative. Some pages in the book have a smaller width, setting up interesting relationships between the images.

Flamboya, Contrasto, 2008, Hardcover, 96 pages

Viviane Sassen's first monograph, Flamboya brings together photos from various trips to Africa. As it happens with memories or thoughts, photographs are not isolated: they form a fluid stream of associations and connections.

Die Son Sien Alles, 2002 - 2004

Viviane Sassen photographed the series Die Son Sien Alles in the townships of Cape Town during several visits between 2002 and 2004, looking at the interior decoration of people's homes, shops and bars.