Louise Bourgeois – Sacks ("Berets")

The Schinkel Pavillon, a Berlin-based center focused on contemporary art production in a domain of media art, sculpture, and installation has decided to organize an exhibition titled Louise Bourgeois: The Empty House. Dedicated to the artist’s fascination with the form of sacks (“berets”), this show intends to examine this important and peculiar motif in order to emphasize the later works from the 2000s until her death in 2010.

The peculiar form of sacks has captured the attention of Louise Bourgeois in the early 1990’s. She started using the variations of sack-shape (filled, transparent, and pilled) in the last phase of her life.

The starting point for articulation came naturally from the woman’s body, as the form resembles the womb, breasts or the female genitalia, and at the same time possess strong sculptural potential. Therefore, these works are to be perceived not only as an active critique of the patriarchal codes of representation of female bodies e.g. their incompleteness, but also as providers of an extraordinary survey on the aging process, maternity, and death.