On the opening of Rebecca Brodskis’ solo show at Fabienne Levy Gallery, Geneva, Art Vista Magazine spoke to her about disconnection, observing the dichotomies of society, and melting colours.  Rebecca Brodskis was born in 1988 and lives and works in Marseille. She spent most of her childhood living between France and Morocco. Brodskis studied painting at the Ateliers des Beaux Arts de la Ville de Paris and at Central St. Martins College of Art and Design in London, graduating in 2010. In 2015, she completed a Master’s degree in Sociology, focusing her research on the themes of vulnerabilities and social crisis. Exploring the borders of the logical world, Brodskis’ work shifts between conscious and unconscious spaces, leading to a reflection on existence, the self and otherness. The idea of inhabiting an in-between world is prominent in Brodskis’ work, an intermediate space at the crossroads of reality and imagination, order and disorder, materialism and spirituality, determinism and freedom.

Kristen Knupp, Art Vista Magazine: At your current exhibition at Fabienne Levy Gallery, Geneva, “Together Separated”, it states that your work, “offers a subtle and incisive meditation on the tensions between closeness and disconnection – both intimate and social.” Would you say that is an accurate description of your work, or would you describe it differently?

Rebecca Brodskis: The entire idea behind the show is how we are individual, and at the same time we are more and more self-adsorbed especially since the advent of social media and mobile phones. The younger generations have huge problems with social anxiety because they are connected all the time, but in reality there is a whole dichotomy between overexposure on social media and a complete inability to be socially present. So, it is something that strikes me, especially because I have a young child myself who is seven years old, and all his friends already have phones. Some of them are unable to speak to each other because they are not present. I was thinking about this when I created the pieces for this exhibition, and through these paintings of different characters I wanted to focus on how they feel like they are there, but they are also not very there. There is an absence and a presence at the same time. 

I really wanted to work with backgrounds where the characters are almost melting into it, they are so disconnected that they are melting into their surroundings. Most of them do not look at you. I feel like we are disconnecting more and more these days even though we think we are more and more connected. There is something that is very distancing about all the technology we have. My daughter is very young and when she is on public transport, she loves to go up to people and smile but everybody is so focused on their little thing that they won’t interact – they’re not there really, they are completely absent.

KK: Would you say that your art is a criticism of technology and modern life and the way that we are so disconnected by this?  

RB: In a way, yes, but it is more of an observation. I stopped studying painting at some point and I went to study sociology. I guess I always have this way of treating my paintings which is that I am a human being, like anyone else, and I am just observing the society I live in. Instead of writing about it I paint about it, and this is like social observation. This is how I want to treat painting; it is a mirror of what I am going through. I also have a diary, so I do both. I write, and my diary is observations as well as my paintings.

KK: You have exhibited in many different cities – Palm Beach, London, Geneva – which is your favorite city to exhibit your work in, and where do you find that you get the best reception of your work?

RB: To be honest, I was just thinking about this because yesterday I was in Lausanne, and I really enjoyed it because it was not such a big opening with too many people. It was a good amount of people who you could really engage with. Everybody was so interested in the paintings and asking so many questions. I spent so much time with each guest speaking about my practice, and so it was a very good experience. In some cities you go and it is tons of people, but in the end, you just float through the opening and after three hours everybody leaves and it is like nothing has happened, and you didn’t even have one single meaningful conversation. That can be just a bit superficial. When you work one year towards a show and then people are just coming and it is more about being at an opening and having a glass of wine and a chit chat, and not interacting with the artwork, or the artist, it can be frustrating. After Lausanne, then of course I like showing in Paris because I have all my friends and family there. This is always nice, especially because as an artist you are in your studio all the time, alone, and openings and exhibitions are the moments when you interact with public. It is always very interesting to see the different reactions.

KK: I wanted to talk a bit about the figures in your painting, they have unusual colouring, for example, the eye colours and skin colours. I find that some of them are androgynous, and you also have shown people embracing each other. What are you trying to communicate about people and relationships through your work?

RB: My work is decorative and portraiture but at the same time, they are also unreal. For me, it is not about picturing humans as they are, but with another dimension to it. My skin tones are never really proper skin tones. The white people look grayish, and the black people also, everybody is a little weird. And with the gaze, the eyes, I’m more interested in the light, the reflection of the light into the eyes. That is why the colours are always a bit strange because I am not really painting the eye colour, but more what it reflects. Sometimes I paint a friend or a person who really inspires me, either a film director, writer, dancer, or someone else. I decide that I really want to paint that person because I feel connected to that person at that moment. But then it is my own interpretation of that person, it is not real. I don’t use photographs next to my work when I paint, or if I do, they are black and white blurry photographs that do not influence me too much. 

KK: How you find your subjects? Is it through books, or real people that you meet or see in public?

RB: Sometimes they just come out of nowhere. I start sketching and then that’s it, they appear. Sometimes it is a friend that I am spending a lot of time with and suddenly that person appears in my painting. Other times I am sitting on public transportation and see someone, and I think: “oh wow that person is so interesting, I’m going to paint that person.” I then paint from memory. It really varies. I am quite spontaneous with what I paint, I am a very unplanned person. If you see the paintings at the beginning, and then how they are at the end, you wouldn’t even recognise that it is the same painting. I’m trying to work on that because I am losing a lot of time by working this way. I am trying to do more planning with my work. I’m doing something very large scale for my next show, and if you don’t plan it takes a long time. So now I’m trying to sketch more and to have a bit of more defined idea of what I want to do from the outset. But I cannot do that with colours. Colours just evolve with the painting. I cannot decide ahead what it is going to be, so I just start with whatever colour. Then some fit, and some don’t, and I continue to work on them. Each one of my paintings has between 15 to 20 layers. Usually in my studio, I have 5 or 6 pieces going at the same time because they need to dry between the layers. I work on one painting, and then I go back to another one, and it is a dialogue between them.

KK: My next question is about the style of your work. You have a unique way of doing portraiture. Has your style evolved over time? 

RB:  It definitely has evolved over time. I think that if you don’t see any evolution in your work, you probably want to stop painting. So now I am doing more details, and I’m trying to refine it, to make more delicate in some way. I think it was a little rough before. Also, as I said, I want to start working with less layers, to have something more thin and more diluted. I used to start straight away with quite thick layers, and it is difficult because if the painting is not greasy enough, then the layers are not going to stick. I only work with oil paint and it takes forever to dry. I’m really trying to start with more turpentine and dilute it a lot more.

KK: Which artists inspire you?

RB: I really like the artists from the New Objectivity movement because they had a very sociological approach to painting where they were really debating their approach to art. Artists like Otto Dix, Max Beckmann, etc. I also love Marlene Dumas, for example, her work is breathtaking. Then, I love Alice Neel and Georgia O’Keefe. I mean, I love painting in general, to be honest. But not really people like Jackson Pollock, even though I understand that it was an important breakthrough in the history of art, but for me, it’s not touching. I also like Balthus even though, of course, I am aware of his reputation, I still like his work.

KK: What about the Swiss artist Nicholas Party? Some of his work with portraiture reminds me of your work. Do you know him?

RB: I love his work, yes. Many people are also connecting me to Tamara Lempicka, however, for me, she’s not a reference. I like her painting, but I find it a bit too technical for me. With some paintings I feel like it is just technique, however, for me it is important to have both technique and to let loose. The more you paint, the more technique develops and then you can get very stuck with that technique because you know how to paint this one thing exactly and it’s going to be perfect. But perfection is not really what I think we should look for. I do also really like Claire Tabouret and the way she paints people; it is interesting. There is such a good generation of young painters in France. In Marseilles, where I live, there are a lot of artists, but not many galleries, which is a bit frustrating because it is a big city so there should be more of an art market. I have opened a studio in Marseille with about 30 artists working there. Every two weeks I organise visits from galleries and curators to try to help promote the work of these young artists.

KK: I wanted to ask you about the titles of your work and about their names. Are they fictional names, or somehow based in reality?

RB: Some are based on real people, like one is a dancer from one of my shows, while others are completely made up. I spend at least six to eight months with these paintings around me, so I need to call them something, because it is really a dialogue. You spend so many hours with these fictional characters and sometimes I actively speak to them, because it is a very lonely job. As a painter, you’re basically alone all day. I work eight hours a day in my studio. I don’t usually even take a midday break, so sometimes I speak to the paintings.

KK: What are your plans? What is coming up?

RB: I have a museum show in Mexico this summer at the Centro de las Artes San Luis Potosi which four hours from Mexico City. It is the museum’s anniversary at the same time, and it is an old jail that is very beautiful. I am bringing 15 to 20 paintings there. After that, I’m having a duo show in Vienna with Christine König Gallery, where I will do a show with the fashion photographer Elfie Semotan. She is an 84-year-old photographer from Austria and New York who is very well known. I’m preparing for this show right now, and she has already sent me the series of photographs that she is going to present. I am trying to make a mix between my practice and use some elements of her practice. This is something completely new for me and it is very interesting. I have really enjoyed it. I zoom into one of her photographs and then find some patterns that I then put into the painting. I am making 8 paintings for this show and some are really large, like, 2m x 160 cm. It is very exciting.

Rebecca Brodskis: Together Separated is at Fabienne Levy Gallery, Genève until 9 September, 2025.