Since 2017, the artist Maria Pomiansky has been drawing and painting portraits of Esther Eppstein on various occasions at the message salon embassy, as well as in private moments. To mark the exhibition celebrating thirty years of message salon, Maria Pomiansky and Esther Eppstein are presenting the zine “Esther”, featuring a selection of drawings and paintings from 2017 onwards.
On display in the current exhibition is the collaborative key work “Triptych”, comprising three portraits of Esther Eppstein, aka Madame l’Ambassadeur, in oil on canvas, which were created between 2020 and 2023 during hours-long portrait sessions in Maria’s studio and at the message salon embassy Réception on Köchlistrasse.
The paintings are both portraits and self-portraits; they are an artistic collaboration and performative scenography, a documentary-narrative moment exploring the role of the artist, condensed in space and time. “Triptych” is also an ode to artistic friendship and the studio, and a reference to painting and its history in art – a position situated between artistic freedom and commissioned work, between tradition and modernity.