Senta Simond

Following Swiss artist Senta Simond’s recent institutional solo exhibition at the prestigious MEP in Paris in 2023, Webber Gallery are delighted to be exhibiting the first showcase of the artist’s work in Los Angeles, opening during Frieze LA 2024.

Renowned for photographs of the female body that counter stereotypical views of feminine beauty, Simond has created a new and ongoing body of work Dissonance; an ensemble of videos and photos. Perhaps the centrepiece of the exhibition exists in a visual and sound dialogue between two young women who have never met in person: a young Ukrainian dancer and an Irish harpist. The work, which combines Simond’s images with footage by the two young women, whom she asked to film themselves inspired by her approach, also speaks to ideas of staging and performance, improvisation and chance.

This depiction of chance and visual conversation is an extension and further dive in to the approaches shown in Simond’s seminal series Rayon Vert, where the artist used the metaphor of Eric Rohmer’s 1986 film of the same name to describe her movements. The meteorological optical phenomenon, or ‘green flash’, serves as a translation as to how Simond and sitter are moving around one another, waiting for the moment or flash when the two viewpoints and forms collide to create the photograph – perhaps a more feminine and humanistic version of Bresson’s decisive moment.

One line of more straight photographic works in the series Dissonance focuses on close-ups, off kilter snapshots and abstractions of the harpist playing, alongside portraits and subtle nuances of movement and poise. Simond presents us with a very intimate, mysterious and sensory experience in which our relationships with ourselves, others, and our environment is in question.