Most pictures today want to convince you of something, but Babette Semmer's drawings follow their own unshakeable order. A world which at first seems known and reliable appears on closer inspection to contain an inner mystery. Standing on a Given Leg is a collection of 14 pencil drawings of teenagers, young women, parents and children. We look upon our time as if from a vast distance; her modern figures become touched with the flat mannered pose of Egyptian wall painting. Semmer’s precise yet searching pencil drawings uncover the iconic in the everyday; the particular in the ordinary; the strange in the familiar; the eternal in the present. The protagonists do not look at you but remain completely occupied with themselves. And it is precisely their self-absorption that makes us feel empathy. To observe them is to see the absurdity of our lives. Text by Toni Mauersberg


Babette Semmer (*1989, London, UK) lives and works in Berlin. She studied at the Slade School of Fine Art in London and at the Städelschule in Frankfurt am Main in the class of Amy Sillman and Monika Baer. Her work has been exhibited at the Bonner Kunstverein, at Spoiler Aktionsraum in Berlin and at Tramps Ltd in London amongst other venues. In 2024 she was awarded the visual art work stipend of the Senate Department for Culture and Social Cohesion of Berlin. 

Original drawings from the zine are available.
14 x 21.5 cm (A5), pencil on paper, 2022, $350
Please inquire by email