Bending, Dripping, Stumbling

The exhibition ‘Bending, Dripping, Stumbling’ brings together the works of Milva Stutz and Sander van Deurzen, two artists whose practices engage in a dynamic dialogue about transformation, materiality, and the fragile nature of human experience. While they work in distinct mediums—Stutz through drawing and video, van Deurzen through painting—their shared interest in movement, transience, and organic forms ties their works together. Sander van Deurzen challenges the conventions of painting by embracing softness and fluidity. His canvases, marked by long, dripping brushstrokes and sagging forms, reject the rigid structures of modernism and minimalism. The stretcher bars of his paintings are bent, allowing the works to slouch and curve away from the wall, almost as if they are exhausted, deflated. The result is a painterly language that highlights material transformation, playfully undermining the traditional solidity of the canvas. His use of color—bright yet with an underlying unease—echoes the expressive tensions found in the works of James Ensor, blending humor with a sense of absurdity. Milva Stutz, on the other hand, explores transformation and transience on an emotional and relational level. Her large-scale charcoal and pastel drawings depict moments of intimacy, uncertainty, and connection. Working with dry materials, she smudges and blends with her fingers, allowing the touch of the artist to remain present in the final work. While van Deurzen’s paintings embrace liquidity and physical distortion, Stutz’s drawings capture the fleeting nature of human relationships. Whether in the turbulence of a disrupted airplane cabin or the intimate gaze of a reclining figure, her works pull the viewer into emotionally charged scenes that hover between vulnerability and control. Despite their differences in approach, both artists share an interest in the moment where things shift—when paint drips, when relationships change, when control gives way to unpredictability. Their works embrace the beauty of imperfection, reminding us that transformation is at the heart of both art and life. Milva Stutz (born 1985, Zurich CH) lives and works in Zurich, where she completed a Master’s degree in Fine Arts at the Zurich University of the Arts in 2019. Her recent solo exhibitions include Kunsthaus Langenthal (2024), Kunsthalle Luzern (2023). Group exhibitions include Kunsthaus Zurich (2024), Bildraum07, Vienna (2023), a&o Kunsthalle Leipzig (2023), TSCHÜÜSS festival at Centre Culturel Suisse, Paris (2022), Drawing Performance at documenta fifteen (2022), and Werkschau at Museum Haus Konstruktiv, Zurich (2021). In April 2025, she will participate in a group exhibition at the Istituto Svizzero in Rome. Her video works have been shown at various international film festivals, including the Annecy International Animated Film Festival (2022/2020), PÖFF Black Nights Film Festival in Tallinn (2020), Tricky Women Festival in Vienna (2022/2020), Guanajuato International Film Festival in Mexico (2019), and DOK Leipzig (2018). Sander van Deurzen (born 1975, Blerick NL) is a Dutch artist based in Amsterdam. He earned his Master of Fine Art from HKU in Utrecht in 2017. In 2024 he was awarded the prestigious Jeanne Oosting Prize and in 2003, the Royal Award for Modern Painting. Van Deurzen has held solo exhibitions at institutions such as the Verbeke Foundation (Belgium), Museum The Beyerd (NL), Noord Brabants Museum (NL). His work is included in several museum collections, including Museum Voorlinden (Wassenaar), Kunstmuseum Den Haag, Dordrechts Museum, and Museum Bommel Van Dam (Venlo), as well as in private and corporate collections in the Netherlands, Switzerland and Belgium, to name just a few.