In cooperation with Fumetto Comic Festival Lucerne

Brian Dawn Chalkley (*1948) has been exploring gender, sexuality and identity for many decades. Chalkley's female alter ego Dawn entered his art 30 years ago. Since then, the interplay between Brian and Dawn has been an important impulse for Chalkley's work. This dialogue between the sexes enables narration, performance and the dream of being someone else.

Quickly painted with a soft brush, Chalkley's characterful portraits tell of melancholy and sadness. The textile works are full of stories: Drawn, embroidered and with texts, they show deserted seaside resorts or barren parks, isolated beings, good and bad dreams. The perspective is flat and reminiscent of folk art. This superficial naivety contrasts with the complexity and ambiguity of the scenes and figures. Tragic moments are paired with black humor in the face of the absurdity of the world.


Note: This text was translated by machine translation software and not by a human translator. It may contain translation errors.