March 9 and 10, 2024, Tamara Jungnickel exhibited at the gallery.

Tamara Jungnickel is a draughtswoman.

During her graduation from the Royal Academy in The Hague (1996), drawing was still an undervalued subject. It was seen only as a preliminary stage to painting. Drawing is now seen as full-fledged, though. And that’s fine, because drawing suits Tamara.

It has become her language to express her feelings of insecurity, unfreedom and feeling displaced. These feelings came about because she moved often as a child, even from Canada, where she was born, to Germany. That last move in particular had a great impact on her emotionally and physically.

Her drawings are about herself, her family and its history. The general theme is people and their relationship with themselves, the family and the environment in which they live. They are stories that poetically express human experiences and emotions.

Tamara prefers to work on “vintage paper” from old books or notebooks. That often has a lived-in look and a different color that suits her work well. Her work table is usually littered with small notes, sketches and writings, a kind of breeding ground, from which new ideas emerge. By shifting and continuing to look, new and different perspectives emerge, ultimately an endless source of inspiration and possibilities. In the final work, she likes to combine the thinness of a watercolor with charcoal, conté or pastel. This creates a combination of volatile and hard, a nice contrast.