iDavid Zwirner · Chelsea
Jem Perucchini: Sospiro
New figurative paintings by Italian, Ethiopian-born Jem Perucchini (b. 1995), drawing on Renaissance painting, African wax prints and Ethiopian church frescoes. His first US exhibition.
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Preview: written before the show opened
In Sospiro (2026), the painting the show is named after, a young figure with cropped dark hair looks sideways out of a speckled emerald-green field, dressed in the same green. The title is Italian for "sigh", which Perucchini calls "the passage between the inner self and the external world".
This is the Milan-based painter's first show in the US: new paintings of single figures and pairs, plus Icarus, Narcissus, Inanna and Gilgamesh, often under a glowing moon or sun. He sprays the canvases with an oil-based emulsion, which gives them their mottled skin. The two graphite drawings, each of a lone figure at a chessboard, are the first drawings he has shown in public. In Washington Square Park, a lone player at a chessboard is waiting for you to sit down.
There are no reviews yet, so go for the jewel-toned color and the slow, sidelong figures. Entry is free at 52 Walker Street in Tribeca, and the opening reception is Friday 6 November, 6 to 8pm.
Look for
Sospiro (2026)
The title painting: a young figure with cropped dark hair glances sideways out of a speckled emerald-green ground, wearing the same green.
The two chess drawings
His largest works on paper so far, in graphite, each showing one figure alone at a game of chess, and the first drawings he has shown in public.
The sprayed surfaces
Get close to the canvases to see the mottled, patina-like finish he builds by spraying them with an oil-based emulsion.
The mythic figures
Look for Icarus, Narcissus, Inanna and Gilgamesh among the new paintings, cast as the lithe, youthful figures he paints from imagination.
Good for
- Cheap Culture
- Locals Who've Seen It All
- Rainy Days
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Image credits
9
- Jem Perucchini: SospiroCourtesy the artist and Corvi-Mora, London
- Anna Maria Maiolino. ANNA—And the Infinite LineCourtesy of Hauser & Wirth
- David Lamelas: The MachineJoeyvandernaald, via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0
- David Byrne: Stairwell DrawingsDavid Byrne / Pace Gallery
- David ZwirnerCourtesy David Zwirner
- Hauser & WirthJim.henderson, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0
- Dia ChelseaFound5dollar, via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0
- Pace GalleryPace Gallery
- GagosianKazuhisa Otsubo (Flickr/cytech), via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 2.0