Shi Shi Chi Chi: Jala Wahid, Jo Dennis, Paulina Stasik and Rebecca Lindsmyr
Opening
Thursday, 27 March at 5 – 7 PM
Curated by Ashik Zaman and Koshik Zaman
The exhibition Shi Shi Chi Chi bears a title that in fact does not explicitly say much about the art. At the same time, it would be incorrect to say that the title says nothing. The title alludes to both the one and the other that are included in the exhibition, while the exhibition is also a conscious departure from the curators' usually thematic exhibitions. This is to instead be an exhibition where a harmony at best occurs even without a pronounced thematic approach, yet a space that evokes curiosity in the viewer in such a way that they want to be in the room with peace to see their own possible connections. So much is often said and promised in texts like this that it ultimately becomes urgent to more "silently" hand over an exhibition to an audience, with faith that art can still grip its viewer. The exhibition presents a group of artists who are all being shown for the first time in Stockholm, and contains elements of mostly new painting.
Shi Shi Chi Chi is Ashik and Koshik Zaman's second exhibition at Belenius, after You Were Bigger Than the Sky, You Were More Than Just a Short Time in spring 2023.
Jala Wahid
Born in 1988, Jala Wahid is an internationally acclaimed British-Kurdish artist based in London. Wahid works with sculpture, film, sound and installation. Her artistry is rooted in archive-based research. The works often have an immediatevisual appeal, but often carry a weight that is not always obvious to the viewer.
Jala Wahid graduated from Goldsmiths College, London in 2014 and completed her PgDip in Fine Art at the Royal Academy of Arts, London, in 2019. Selected solo exhibitions include: GAK, Bremen (2023 – 24), Kunstverein Freiburg, Freiburg (2023), Sophie Tappeiner, Vienna (2023) and Niru Ratnam, London (2024, 2022). Wahid will be exhibiting her film I Love Ancient Baby at the High Line in NYC in spring 2025. Wahid was also nominated for the prestigious Crica Prize in 2024.
Jo Dennis
Born in 1973 in the UK, Jo Dennis is a British artist based in London. Dennis received her MA in Painting from the Royal College of Art London (2022) and her BA Fine Art and Contemporary Critical Theory from Goldsmiths College London (2002).
Her practice spans two decades and works with painting, sculpture, photography and installation. Dennis explores our emotional connection to place and memory, specifically in relation to surface and decay, and how these themes link to notions of mortality.
Recent exhibitions include; JO-HS, Mexico City (solo, ongoing), PM/AM Gallery, London (group, 2024), Newchild Gallery, Antwerp, Belgium (solo, 2023). Dennis has recently been featured in international press such as Vogue, Hypebeast and Forbes.
Paulina Stasik
Born in 1990 in Rzeszów, Poland. Lives and works in Kraków. Paulina Stasik graduated from the Faculty of Painting at the Academy of Fine Arts in Krakow where she later also received her PhD in 2020.
Paulina Stasik's complex paintings appear sensual at first glance, with an almost erotic charge. The characteristic color range in shades of red, blue and purple is the result of a laborious painting process, which successively applies many layers of paint. Central to the paintings is the female figure, which recurs in different roles and constellations; as mothers, sisters, friends and enemies. Furthermore, Stasik is interested in the body and its duality; both as a bearer of power but also as an object of decay and mortality.
Stasik has previously exhibited at, among others, Museum Kampa, Prague, Czech Republic (2025), Museum of Modern Art, Warsaw, Poland (2022), Zachęta – National Gallery of Art, Warsaw (2022), Raster Gallery, Warsaw (2020, 2023) and in a solo exhibition at Lyles & King, NYC (2024). Later this year, Paulina will be the subject of a large solo exhibition at BWA in Tarnów, Poland.
Rebecca Lindsmyr
Born 1990 in Edsbyn, Sweden. Lives and works in Malmö/Paris. Rebecca Lindsmyr graduated from Malmö Academy of Fine Arts (MFA) and Glasgow School of Art (BFA), UK.
In her theoretically grounded painting that encompasses both the abstract and figurative, Lindsmyr works with multiple layers, often up to ten, and in this way builds up a depth and complexity. It is a time-consuming process that is not rushed. It is a longer build-up phase that then culminates in a final explosive phase. For the exhibition, Lindsmyr shows a completely new work that gives a small nod to her new suite that will be presented later this year.
Lindsmyr was shown at Art Basel 2024 and will also be exhibited at this year's edition of Nils Staerk (Copenhagen) where she is currently working towards an upcoming solo exhibition that opens in August 2025, her second solo exhibition at the gallery. Furthermore, Lindsmyr received the Swedish Academy of Fine Arts' scholarship for a residency at the Cité Internationale des Arts in Paris (July 2023 – February 2024).
