Birgit Brenner is a fearless excavator of the psyche, ultimately no doubt her own, but still her works have humor and irony. Living Life means there is always something wonderful and hopeful and it is worth taking risks. Birgit Brenner, b. 1964 and lives and works in Berlin. She is a renowned Professor of Art at the Staatliche Akademie der Bildenden Künste in Stuttgart and has been represented by Eigen + Art, in Berlin and Leipzig since 1992. Her work has been shown extensively in Europe including a 2011 major exhibit at the Dortmunder Kunstverein in Germany. She was recipient for the Prices Kunstpreis Tisa von der Schulenburg-Stiftung in 2004, Christian Karl Schmidt Förderpreis für zeitgenössische Kunst in 2003 and PS1 in New York. Other solo exhibitions include: Galerie Eigen + Art, Leipzig (2010). Haus am Lützowplatz, Berlin (2009). Galerie Eigen + Art, Berlin (2007). Selected group exhibitions include: Galerie Erlangen (2010), Kunsthalle Mannheim (2010), Temporare Kunsthalle, Berlin (2009), Beurs van Berlage, Amsterdam, The Netherlands (2009). Andrew Brischler explores what he calls “the pathology of abstraction” in his own mixed-media canvases, in which he ranges through the many manifestations of this mode of painting, foregrounding its enduring beauty while questioning its seriousness. On battered, stained canvases, he paints hard-edged, minimalist forms weighted down by the thickness of their own paint; saturated fields of graded color, too rainbow-like to suggest sublimity; and abstract expressionistic scribbles and brushstrokes that appear either absurdly meek or exaggerated. By working such intentional awkwardness and humor into his compositions, and titling his paintings after song lyrics, pop cultural events, and lines from movies, Brischler simultaneously references and rejects the storied history of 20th-century abstraction. Claiming, “Abstract painting can get really heavy with reference and psychological baggage,” he posits a lighter vision of abstraction for the 21st century in his own works