YveYANG Gallery is pleased to announce Pinch Me Hard and Soft, the US solo debut of German artist Pauline Rintsch (b. 1995). Akin to the acrobatic anguish in Balthus, Rintsch captures figures with dynamic poses in abstract settings, only magnified with an enigmatic femininity. Her fluid use of oil on paper enlivens uncanny psychological depth to each of her subjects – stale, moist, clunky and alive, transforming mundane feelings into subtle erotics, imperfect scenarios into magical tinkerings. The exhibition text is by Hindley Wang. The exhibition will be on view from June 28 to August 17, 2024, with an opening reception on June 28 from 6–8 PM.

I lived mostly inside a mirror. Two minutes after my birth I had already lost my origins.

—Clarice Lispector, The Passion According to G.H. (1964)

Pauline Rintsch paints reflections and navels. She looks at herself in the mirror, at her friend in the rearview, at her own belly button and those mystic beginnings finding her in dreams. She also bends her figures in acrobatic contortions, elongates their gazes in longing uncertainty, and confronts them in abrasive environments. The settings are usually vague but particular-like wombs. Fluid and hollow.