In her debut solo exhibition in France, Zvavahera unveils an expansive 17-meter canvas that transforms Open Space #15 into a realm of ethereal visions. Inspired by prophetic dreams, her work merges Christian and indigenous Zimbabwean iconography, capturing the fluid boundaries between the material and spiritual worlds, love and solitude.
Portia Zvavahera, Imba Yerumbidzo (Maison de Grâce), 2024. Vue d’installation (détail) Galerie 8, Fondation Louis Vuitton © Portia Zvavahera. Courtesy Stevenson and David Zwirner Photo : © Fondation louis Vuitton / Marc Domage
For Open Space #15, her first personal exhibition in France, Portia Zvavahera has conceived a new painting called Imba Yerumbidzo (House of Praise). Eight canvases gathered as panorama of near 17 meters long, this monumental painting unfolds in a curve covering the walls of the gallery 8, redesigning the space.
Portia Zvavahera’s paintings are based on her dreams. Steeped in Christian convictions and indigenous Zimbabwean beliefs, the artist considers her nocturnal visions to be prophecies, the emotional intensity of which she seeks to transcribe through painting. They raise questions of life and death, the material and the spiritual, love and solitude, the personal that touches the universal.
Here, the artist conjures her phantasmagorical universe through multiple silhouettes appearing across the surface of the canvas. Their deformed, roughly sketched limbs are diluted in an expressionist touch that emphasises their ghostly presence. With no element of setting or context, these apparitions seem to float freely. The composition is based on a juxtaposition and superimposition of shapes, solids, and motifs, using a variety of techniques: from paint applied with a brush or stick, to stencils and etchings to create patterns using the traditional methods of Zimbabwean batik. On the canvas, rich in material and texture, these sections contrast with the areas left white, in reserve, evoking the “angels” that the artist saw in the dream at the source of this painting.
The exhibition is on view from the 17th of October, 2024, until the 3rd of March, 2025. For more information, please visit Fondation Louis Vuitton.
