Hernan Bas

Nightmares & Melancholy

October 26 - December 20, 2024

Zahnradstrasse 21, Zurich

Galerie Peter Kilchmann is proud to present the fifth solo exhibition of US artist Hernan Bas, featuring a new collection of paintings, works on paper, and the installation A Little Romeo and Juliet in All of Us (2004/24). Bas, recognized as a leading contemporary painter, is known for his vibrant color palette, symbolism, and narratives that explore identity, sexuality, and gender. His work is deeply influenced by 18th-century Gothic "black romanticism," which focuses on human fears and the supernatural. Swiss painter Henry Fuseli, particularly his famous work The Nightmare (1781), serves as a central inspiration for Bas. Fuseli’s intense and eerie imagery of a sleeping woman tormented by a demonic figure and a ghostly horse mirrors the emotional depth and dark aesthetics found in Bas’s art. This exhibition continues Bas’s exploration of the mysterious and the uncanny, blending beauty with themes of fear and desire.

Bas has participated in a number of group exhibitions, including Strike Fast, Dance Lightly: Artists on Boxing, The Norton Museum of Art, West Palm Beach (2024); Portrait of a Man, X Museum, Beijing (2024); What's Going On, Rubell Museum, Washington, D.C. (2022); Fire Figure Fantasy: Selections from ICA Miami’s Collection, Institute of Contemporary Art, Miami (2022); Collection Focus: Our Beginnings Never Know Our Ends, Museum of Contemporary Art, North Miami (2021); Eternal Forest, Paradise Art Space, Incheon, South Korea (2020); Where is the Madness You Promised Me, Hudson Valley Museum of Contemporary Art, Peekskill (2019); Generation Loss, Julia Stoschek Collection, Düsseldorf (2017); On the Horizon: Contemporary Cuban Art from the Jorge M. Pérez Collection, Pérez Art Museum, Miami (2017); Tracing Shadows, PLATEAU, Samsung Museum of Art, Seoul (2015); On Painting, Centro Atlantico de Arte Moderno, Las Palmas de Gran Canaria (2013); Contemporary Magic: A Tarot Deck Art Project, The Andy Warhol Museum, Pittsburgh (2011); The Collectors, curated by Elmgreen & Dragset for the Nordic and Danish Pavilions at the 53rd Venice Biennale, Venice, Italy (2009); Triumph of Painting: Part III, Saatchi Gallery, London, United Kingdom (2005); Ideal Worlds – New Romanticism in Contemporary Art, Schirn Kunsthalle, Frankfurt, Germany (2005); and the Whitney Biennial, New York, NY (2004). Hernan Bas’ work is part of the following collections (selection): Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto, Canada, Brooklyn Museum; Carré d'Art - Musée d'Art Contemporain, Nîmes, France; Detroit, Institute of Arts; Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington DC; Institute of Contemporary Art, Miami; Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles,; Museum of Contemporary Art, North Miami; Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; Museum of Fine Arts, Houston; MoMA, The Museum of Modern Art, New York; New Britain Museum of American Art, New Britain; Philadelphia Museum of Art; Rubell Family Collection, Miami; Saatchi Collection, London, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; Space K, Seoul; Speed Art Museum, Louisville; Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; Williams College Museum of Art, Williamstown; Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven.