Kunstforum Baloise Park presents Euphoric Recall, with a new installation by Vanessa Disler, engaging with the work of her distant relative, Martin Disler, through pieces from the Baloise Corporate Collection.

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Vanessa Disler’s practice navigates the complex legacy of 20th-century gestural abstraction – a genre that has, over the past two decades, been redefined by queer and feminist practices, moving beyond its historically macho foundations. Echoing Michelle Kuo’s insights in Acting Out: The AB-EX Effect, Disler’s approach emphasizes the performative aspect of painting, where the gesture acts as an extension of the artist’s identity and bodily presence.

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Within her work, this revitalized field becomes an arena for exploring themes of identity formation, whether within the nuclear family or through collective identities, and their impact on artistic production. Her work is deeply informed by the methods of psycho- analysis, layered with elements of the absurd, the uncanny, and the fictional. Central to her practice are the dynamics of projection, doubling, and denial, making her approach to authorship multifaceted. The presence of Martin Disler’s work has been a theme running throughout her work, serving as both a grounding influence and a source of tension – a lens through which multiple influences converge.

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In Euphoric Recall, Vanessa Disler reimagines the exhibition space as a bar, inspired by a scene from Paul Schrader's film Light Sleeper. In the film, Willem Dafoe’s character, John LeTour, steps into a bar dominated by a long painting depicting two mirroring demons – a scene that echoes the motifs found in Martin Disler’s art. By night, Disler’s bar becomes a transformative space, where guests are bathed in a different light.

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The installation is intricately linked to the concept of “euphoric recall” – a psychological phenomenon in which memories are perceived more positively than they were originally. Disler connects this psychological concept to various threads in art history, citing iconic bar scenes such as Édouard Manet’s Un bar aux Folies Bergère and Jeff Wall’s Picture for Women. Manet’s painting employs a mirror to reveal a dual perspective of the barmaid and her served guests, while Wall, a fellow Vancouverite of Disler, reinterprets this motif by examining gender dy- namics and the act of seeing through the reflections in his photographic composition.

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Disler’s installation brings together psychological, biographical, and art-historical ele- ments, creating a layered portrait of gestural painting today in form of an allover reflective still-life. The artist directly applies paint to the mirrors of the rear wall of the bar, challenging the way the history of gestural painting – despite its controversies and inconsistencies – has been romanticized. Her work asks us to confront this ‘euphoric memory,’ where the audience’s reflections become entangled with the painted image.

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Euphoric Recall ultimately offers a meditation on the inescapable legacies of art history, from Manet to Wall, while celebrating the complexities and contradictions that continue to shape Disler’s own artistic journey – much like the lingering influence of familial ties.

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