'Ashes to Lashes, Dust to Lust', Group Show at GROVE, Berlin

GROVE is pleased to present the upcoming exhibition Ashes to Lashes, Dust to Lust, a group exhibition featuring Jason Gringler, Brittany Shepherd, Nils Köpfer, Monika Grabuschnigg, Allan Gardner, Marlon De Azambuja, Billie Clarken, and Mark Corfield-Moore, on view at GROVE’s Berlin location from Saturday, March 25th to Wednesday, April 19th, 2023. This is GROVE’s first exhibition at their Greifswalder- str. space, and marks the first time the gallery has worked with Gringler, Shepherd, Grabuschnigg, Azambuja, and Corfield-Moore. 

As the inaugural exhibition at GROVE Berlin, Ashes to Lashes, Dust to Lust can be understood as a “housewarming.” Of course, in literal terms, this has an inherent connection to both heat and fire, making the focus of the show an appropriate, if not sly turn of phrase. But, as Marlon De Azambuja’s fire-based sculpture suggests, this inflection can be doubled-edged: literal combustion has the capacity for danger and destruction. Likewise, the subtle eroticism of Brittany Shepherd’s work can turn up the “heat” in the room, but the artist’s work also gestures towards a precarious bal- ance – as always, love is never far from war. 

Indeed, this thinking carries over to others. Jason Gringler’s brutal sculptures are covered in burning candles, while Mark Corfield-Moore’s birthday cake image sug- gests another, perhaps more comfortable instantiation of a similar, candle-laden ob- ject. This duality, and the insouciant humour that underscores it, bears the mark of much of GROVE’s work to date, while reflecting the eye and sensibility of the gallery’s Berlin director, Hannah Weidner. 

This duality extends to the gallery’s work more broadly. As GROVE embarks on a new chapter, opening its space in Berlin, the exhibition embraces the new’s both positivistic and negativistic qualities: the beginning of a new moment requires the end of the last, and new identities require the dismantling of the old. Additionally, Ashes to Lashes, Dust to Lust presents an opportunity to usher in a new cadre of lo- cal artists into the gallery’s program. Marking the gallery’s first major expansion since opening up in London in 2021, the gallery hopes this to be the start of a new, in- ternational era for its program and artists.