In this show featuring recent works on paper and wood, Du Bois—fully in line with her decades-long exploration of the relationship between word and image, sound and color, meaning and composition, medium and materiality—delves further into her position as an observer and narrator.
Notably, the tone in these new works seems somewhat more clement than in her previous exhibitions. However, this is merely a means to highlight the subjects that both nourish and unsettle her. These include the short-term vision of world leaders and voters, the increasing uninhabitability of our planet, and our apathy toward these issues, etc. Amidst these, she weaves in small yet universal themes such as our interactions with one another and all living beings, deep feelings of loss, and (vain) hope. She also directs her gaze toward beauty and the tragicomic nature of life.
All of this is expressed in sensitive and poignant language—words that do not impose but rather leave room for dialogue and introspection. She deliberately avoids the anecdotal, both in the imagery she evokes and the language she employs. More than ever, she sees the need to escape banalities and platitudes.
She observes and captures our condition humaine, caught between gentleness and sorrow, frustration and compassion, resignation and revolt.
Her works touch upon the fleeting and the profound, history and sensory experience, contradictions and resistance, playfulness and tenderness, as well as the act of searching itself.