Transit 

solo exhibition at Wetterling Gallery, Stockholm, June 4 - July 12, 2025

 

Weterling Gallery is proud to present Transit, the Dutch artist six’t solo exhibition in Stockholm. 
In Transit, Rothman explores the notion of transition—both as a physical passage and a psychological or emotional shift—through a painterly language grounded in movement, and light.

The title Transit refers to a state of in-betweenness, a crossing point between one state and another. In astronomy, the term describes the passage of a celestial body across the face of another. In Rothman’s work, this metaphor extends to the visual realm: each painting captures a moment of transformation, where form and perception remain fluid. The image is not fixed but in constant flux—hovering between abstraction and figuration, light and shadow, presence and absence.   

Rothman draws on the tradition of *chiaroscuro*, the dramatic interplay of light and dark found in 17th-century Dutch painting. But rather than seeking theatrical clarity, she embraces ambiguity. Her brushstrokes emerge from deep, dark grounds, forming entangled vegetation, silhouetted structures, and shifting landscapes. The darkness often carries a sense of unease or foreboding, while the light keeps re-emerging—flickering into view, illuminating fleeting moments of clarity, memory, or emotional resonance. The darkness often carries a sense of unease or foreboding, while the light keeps re-emerging—flickering into view.

The marks suggest motion—windswept branches, flickering reflections—and reveal the act of painting itself. The viewer is invited to oscillate between reading the image and sensing the painterly gesture. 

This approach finds its roots in Rothman’s background in analog photography, where the image is shaped by exposure, light, and time. Similarly, her paintings are created in a single, concentrated session—each canvas a record of an event. The process is visible: paint strokes interact to construct an image that is both raw and luminous, textured and ephemeral. The result is a kind of visual memory—unstable, layered, and always in transition.

Transit reflects Rothman’s ongoing inquiry into perception. Her works do not offer certainties, but dwell in the fragile space where things are still becoming. In this space—this penumbra between recognition and dissolution—light and darkness do not oppose one another, but define and enliven each other. Rothman invites the viewer to inhabit this dynamic threshold, where image and emotion unfold together in real time.

 

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