CURRENT EXHIBITION

Installation image: *JOSEFINA AUSLENDER: La Chimera del Oro*. On view through May 17th, 2026.
PHOTO CREDIT: Luc Demers

JOSEFINA AUSLENDER
La Chimera del Oro (The Golden Chimera)

April 11th - May 17th, 2026

La Chimera del Oro is Josefina Auslender’s second solo presentation with the gallery. Featuring new work in ink alongside a selection of graphite drawings from her time in Argentina, this exhibition furthers Auslender’s presence as a Master of drawing. At 91, she continues to push conceptual and technical boundaries with her work.

For Auslender, the works in ink included in La Chimera del Oro are a personal exploration of both her time in Argentina, fresh out of school, and her experience today. They are an interrogation of the illusions of wealth and success, a testament to the difficulty of forging an independent path as an artist, and an affirmation of the value of honest work.

This series pushes Auslender’s use of ink into a new realm of color and line. The depths of her work – she is known for her rich, dark swaths of black – remain, with the addition of vibrant explorations in gold, yellow, orange, and white.

This exhibition will be on view concurrently with Auslender’s first solo museum retrospective at the Bowdoin College Museum of Art in Brunswick, Maine. Auslender’s work is also currently featured at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Buenos Aires, as part of Continente Oscuro, a survey of women in surrealism.

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EXHIBITION IMAGES

ARTIST STATEMENT

Dictated for the occasion of her solo exhibition at Sarah Bouchard Gallery, April 2026.

La Chimera del Oro (The Golden Chimera)

What I am doing now is reflecting on when I left the School of Fine Arts in Buenos Aires, and my head was full of expectations and admirations. I wanted to be like other people; I wanted to be a successful artist, but my idea of success was like that of many of my classmates and the young artists I met. We wanted to be good. To do beautiful things. To do good art and come out and see what happened. We soon learned that things weren’t like we were taught in the books. The world was changing, and changing rapidly, into … something else. Art became a commodity. People were buying art because in twenty years they could have a fortune, not because they loved art.

A chimera is like walking in the desert, and suddenly you see something shining, and you approach that, and it's so brilliantly beautiful with all those different kinds of yellows and whites, and you approach closer and closer and closer, but you don’t realize that at the same time it is very beautiful, it is very dangerous. It is like a science fiction story, and if you approach it, it swallows you up and takes you over completely. You go into a different dimension and forget all your aspirations. Because new things - exciting and important things - begin to happen to you, and you forget about the art because you don’t have time. You begin working for gold.

Gold becomes like an entity. Like a being that is ruling you, telling you what to do and driving you to different places, because it is very exciting to be close to gold, but at the same time, it is changing you forever.

In a way, I’d like to explain those triangles, and the small debris, where the gold is melting and falling into something more hot - very hot and burning - falling all over. Everything that those drippings of gold touch, they change, including everything around you, completely. And you forget what is really very important because, well … gold is so beautiful.

The person who is immersed in that golden chimera can’t stop. It is like selling your heart – your self – to something very powerful that shows you a beautiful, extraordinary path in life that doesn’t always take you to a happy ending. Because in the end, you realize that you were more interested in gold than in what you were doing. You become afraid of losing those triangles that keep falling over you, constantly. Because they are beautiful. Apparently, your life becomes very beautiful, but you become afraid to step outside that shimmering cloud of gold. So, you stay there and don’t move or do anything that could change things, because you are afraid to lose that kind of brilliance, and your work begins to suffer. A lot. You never change. Your work never changes. And in a way, you die.

You must be strong to leave La Chimera del Oro. These are the mirages of life. You must understand what they imply – they can be wonderful, but also the most terrible thing that can happen to you.

I know it is an unbelievable explanation, but art is that way. You cannot explain art.

Josefina Auslender, 2026