Hall 6 (right) [36-38]

Finally, the exhibition returns to Katherine Bradford’s superheroes. In a recent interview, the artist said that she liked to paint floating and flying women. It is less about overcoming gravity, than about the liberation of women from the roles imposed on them by society, such as the unpaid labor of care, housework, and raising children. Thus, these ​“flying” superheroines inspired by her fantasy can leave behind their households and the seemingly protective spaces, which also restrict them, coming a step closer to freedom. Based on these thoughts, Bradford began to paint a large number of superwomen who represent a counter-narrative to the more stereotypical tropes of the superhero.
The works of this hall, however, also seem to be strongly motivated by personal experience. Bradford’s relocation from Maine to New York is once again central here. Resulting from this move, Bradford became part of a New York community of artists who strongly influenced her practice and paved the way for recognition on the international stage, represented here by Flight to Venice (2023) [37].
Simultaneously, in Pink Studio (2023) [38], Bradford reinforces that being an artist is very hard work. This work can be understood as both autobiographical and self-reflexive, illustrating the artist herself in the studio where she paints day after day. In addition to Bradford’s own openness to change and a very constructive mode of self-criticism, it was of course the exchange with an artist community with protagonists such as Louis Dodd, Amy Sillmann, Judith Bernstein, Mary Heilmann and Rebecca Morris, which enabled her to find her very own style. In this way, Bradford dismantles the myth of the solitary artist-genius working alone, since creation, work and reflection also always take place in community. Since 2015, a consolidation of production took place, which having led to a recognizability of her oeuvre, still impresses with a large variability.
 

[36]
Traveler’s Paradise, 2023
Acrylic on canvas
121,9 x 91,4 cm
Courtesy Katherine Bradford, New York
 

[37]
Flight to Venice, 2023
Acrylic on canvas
76,2 x 101,6 cm
Courtesy Katherine Bradford, New York
 

[38]
Pink Studio, 2023
Acrylic on canvas
76,2 x 101,6 cm
Courtesy Katherine Bradford, New York