CLICK HERE FOR PREVIEW

NıCOLETTı is delighted to announce its third participation in Liste Art Fair, Basel, with a solo exhibition of new works by London-based artist Ana Viktoria Dzinic (1994, DE).

Growing up as a German and Ex-Jugoslavian migrant in Switzerland, Dzinic began her artistic journey by documenting her life as she was navigating the bureaucratic structure of gender reassignment. Using various cameras, the artist began accumulating snapshots of objects and places that encapsulated her past, as well as self-portraits that minutely curated her transforming persona – a series of photographs that won her a trip to New York for a Marc Jacobs campaign in 2015. With subsequent experiences as art consultant for brands like Balenciaga and Gucci, Dzinic gained an astute understanding of image production that she now deconstructs in her practice, using photography, installation and performance to dissect the ideologies embedded in trends while mining the areas where image and identity economies collapse.

At Liste, Dzinic presents a series of portraits of artists and friends in which she blends photography and painting, generating painterly gestures with software while mimicking digital filters with physical pigments and brushstrokes. Transposing Vilém Flusser’s analysis of technical images in the era of global networks, Dzinic’s new cycle of work uses the codes of traditional expressionist portraiture paired with the imagined legacy of mass mediatisation to convey a subject’s ‘aura.’ As the artist explains:

‘I was reprimanded for circulating what some deemed “unflattering” images of friends. This led to the imposition of an ‘approve-before-post’ policy – an edict more commonly associated with Hollywood Starlets or PR agents. Nonetheless, a number of my friends voiced their discontent, accusing me of misrepresentation fueled by the fear of wrong exposure to the right crowd. In response, I began to shape Romantisch, a body of work that adheres to the very logic of the ‘approve-before-post’ rule, which I recognise as the portraiture tradition of the twenty-first-century under the a Business Approved Socialite Doctrine, or the preferred visual legacy of personhood.’

The resulting portraits masquerade as paintings, assembled through images shot with a mobile phone, the immediacy and low resolution of which emphasises personal and intimate connections. Dzinic added a dedicated colour palette to each of her subjects, creating a unique, almost bespoke identification costume that showcases their singularity, just like aura readings, horoscopes or Enneagram Tests. The dimensions and crops are dictated by the golden ratio, ensuring visual harmony.

Beyond technique, the choice of subjects reveals Dzinic’s personal connections to these individuals. For both Girlband New York (formed by ​​artists Coumba Samba and Gretchen Lawrence) and her mother, the artist decided to shoot the their respective hometowns, intrigued by the act of naming oneself after a famous city or to the female archetype of the mother, resulting in works such as I Love New York (Canal Street) in hot pink or Marianne (Mama) in orange.

Other portraits include art critic Dean Kissick, Balenciaga’s Visual Director Leonie Miller-Aichholz, author J.K. Rowling, and Twilight character Edward Cullen (played by actor Robert Pattinson), among others.

Using the codes of glamour, intimacy, and cuteness that dominate digital spaces, these works question the potential and limitation of technical images to convey a person’s ‘soul’, as traditional portraiture once sought. These questions around the value assigned to images are reflected in Dzinic’s choice of subjects: Kissick, a friend of the artist, is the author of a debated article on how politics destroyed art; while figures like Rowling, known both for her Harry Potter books and anti-transgender views, bring biographical and cultural debates into focus. In a world where relationships are increasingly viewed through the prism of economic opportunity, where youth and beauty are obsessions, and where impressions often outweigh the substance of action, Dzinic’s portraits expose both the façade and interiority of crafted personas.