ASPEN ART MUSEUM
MAGAZINE
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Exhibitions
“A Lover’s Discourse”, a new series of artist-led presentations opening this summer at the museum, juxtaposes recent works by early-career artists with companion pieces they have selected from private collections around Aspen. Participants include Guglielmo Castelli, Chase Hall, Stanislava Kovalcikova, Zeinab Saleh, Issy Wood and Ulala Imai, who talked about her dialogue with image-making, past and present, to Terence Trouillot.
A LOVER’S DISCOURSE
When I made this work, I was planning an exhibition at Nonaka-Hill in Los Angeles. The front of the gallery is marked by a retro electric sign, a remnant from its former use as a dry cleaners. It was my first solo exhibition in the United States and this sign made a strong impression on me. When I imagined the work I could see through the sign, I wanted to paint big “Lovers” paintings. This show in the US led me to actively work on large paintings. TT The exhibition in Aspen is titled after Roland Barthes’s A Lover’s Discourse: Fragments [1977], a theoreti- cal book looking at “fragments”, as it were, of love. Can you discuss how your work speaks to this idea? UI In the chapter of the book, “ souvenir / remembrance”, I was very
When I put them side by side and let them sit on the branches of the trees, they gazed into the distance. Some- times they looked positive, sometimes they looked lost in reminiscence. This is a theme I have been working on for several years, changing it up from time to time. TT I know a lot of your work is inspired by your own childhood and you often paint still lifes of your own childrens’ toys. Is the series “Lovers” an example of this and if so, what is your relationship to these characters from Peanuts ? UI When I started painting toys, it began with a display cabinet showing a small collection of souvenirs that my grandmother, who enjoyed traveling in Europe every year, had collected little
TERENCE TROUILLOT Ulala, can you tell me a little bit about your contribution to the exhibition “A Lover’s Discourse”, on view at the Aspen Art Museum this summer. The work you’re presenting is aptly titled Lovers [2023] and depicts the Peanuts characters, Charlie Brown and Lucy van Pelt, suspended in a thicket of trees. I know this is an ongoing series so I’m curious to know what inspired you to make this work? ULALA IMAI The first time I worked on the tree motif was in my yard. My garden is not colorful. It’s simple, with just a row of green trees. I came up with the idea of putting Charlie there in a green outfit and Lucy in a red outfit, then had the idea of lining them up.
by little over time. It was a series of various characters brought together in one setting called “Gathering”, which I have continued to paint for many years. “Lovers” was originally inspired by a vintage Steiff monkey I had in my collection and a yellow bear, which I don’t know where it came from. I paint- ed them together and at first, the series was called “Hold”, as I showed them play-fighting. Somewhere along the way, they became a mysterious couple: one of them restrains the other, who some- how appears resigned to this act. The Peanuts series started when I bought Charlie and Lucy soft toys in a flea market somewhere on my travels. I was drawn to the combination of red and green outfits and the simplicity of the smiley faces.
Opposite, top Ulala Imai in her studio in Kanagawa, Japan, May 2023
Photography Keita Goto
Opposite, bottom Ulala Imai, Lovers , 2023. Courtesy: the artist; photograph: Kei Okano
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