Bobbi Essers Puts Friendship First in 'The World at Our Command'

Bobbi Essers' paintings are akin to an optical illusion, it’s hard to tell where bodies end and begin. Unexpectedly cropped forms are puzzled together by auratic symmetry, only to be superimposed by a new image completely. Echoing the cohesive and fragmented nature of memories, her compositions are much more than the sum of their parts.

Unit London presents The World at Our Command, a new solo show by the Dutch rising star. In a song of skin and cloth, the exhibition channels the ethos of contemporary youth. Bearing intensity and intimacy in equal breath, the artist captures tender friendship in a collage of candid moments.

By keeping subjects anonymous, Essers' work welcomes compositional overlap, giving universal resonance to personal emotions and experiences. “The face doesn’t hold much power for me. There are many more ways to understand the closeness of people than through their facial expressions, ” the artist notes in a recent gallery statement. “My work is more about friendships than the friends themselves.”

The exhibition embodies the hope of a young generation yearning for platonic intimacy. Reflected in titles such as “Should we just keep driving?” and “Yet we still want more,” Essers confronts her future with magnetic confidence: “It’s saying that we decide our own world. I command what I paint and how I do it, and why. We are up-and-coming, and we are leading in our own ways.”

Head to Unit London to catch The World at Our Command on view from September 28 through December 8, 2024.

Unit London
3 Hanover Square
London W1S 1HD

Click here to view full gallery at Hypebeast