Edi Dubien – LIBRE, 2024
Edi Dubien – Cailloux, 2024
Edi Dubien – Maison, 2024
Edi Dubien – Renard, 2024

Echoing his own history, Edi Dubien explores the social, psychological and emotional constructs of the individual, which are sometimes at odds with conventional discourse and imposed patterns of life. His drawings and watercolours conjure up images of flora and fauna and depict people — from childhood to adulthood — reduced to silence by the violence of a society that respects neither difference nor the environment. Edi Dubien’s work is a sensitive dialogue between humans and nature. It invites the viewer to recognise the importance of accepting our own difference and showing respect for others.

Edi Dubien’s pictorial and sculptural work draws on personal memories in its representations of objects and characters that have symbolic meaning for him. Hanging from the arches of the old workshops, LIBRE (“FREE”) is a huge reproduction of a goodluck charm that used to hang from the key of a large wardrobe in the artist’s home. This “grigri” is there to ward off bad luck, and reflects Edi Dubien’s love of the living world as well as his penchant for collecting art objects and folk bric-a-brac in junk shops and flea markets. Alongside this assemblage, three canvases depict young men surrounded by a kind of white matter that, according to Edi Dubien, connotes energy, vitality and hope. With these triumphant, victorious figures, the artist proudly asserts his identity and registers a form of virility.