Cornelia Schleime

The art of Cornelia Schleime, born in Berlin in 1953, is characterised by a delightful tendency towards exaggeration. Her artistic means are impressively diverse, whether painting, music, literature or film.

Cornelia Schleime is one of the best-known German painters of her generation. In addition to painting, she is also artistically active as a photographer, filmmaker, performer and author. Schleime was born in East Berlin and studied graphic art and painting at the Dresden Academy of Fine Arts. However, she was banned by the GDR government from exhibiting in 1981 and obtained permission to leave the GDR in 1984. Schleime was only able to take a few of her works with her so that a large part of her early work is now considered lost.

Especially her portraits are much admired. Since the 1990s, she has been bringing her protagonists closer and closer. She develops haunting portraits of women and children, couples kissing, lascivious nuns, even the Pope. With an inquiring gaze, the artist approaches the face, the ever-changing countenance of the human being – it becomes wrapped, veiled, sometimes with a mask.

Schleime has received numerous scholarships and awards. Her paintings are part of collections worldwide, such as the Gemäldegalerie der Staatlichen Kunstsammlungen, Dresden and the Getty Museum, Los Angeles. She lives and works in Berlin, in Ruppiner Land and on La Palma.

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