Goodman Gallery is pleased to present two solo exhibitions by Rose Shakinovsky (b.1953) and Claire Gavronsky (b.1957) in its London location. Originally from Johannesburg, the couple have been based in Italy since 1985. Employing very diverse techniques and visual languages, both artists explore collective responses to current crisis and trauma. Shakinovsky and Gavronsky have collaborated as the artist “rosenclaire” since 1986. rosenclaire run a renowned artist residency programme in Tuscany where they have been mentors to the same group of 85 international artists from 13 countries, for over 30 years.

Building on her 2024 solo exhibition at Goodman Gallery London, ‘Drawn Together’, Claire Gavronsky‘s current series of paintings addresses how women and children endure and survive situations of extreme adversity, by virtue of their generosity and support of one another. The work is a response to ongoing global conflicts, where survival depends on solidarity, sharing intimate moments of human connection, embracing, holding and caring, as forms of resistance and healing.

In her pink monochrome paintings of encounters between two women, the fine, graceful and precise line drawings capture two older women poised in empathetic gestures of deep affection and understanding. Gavronsky deliberately strips away colour and background context to focus on the emotional and physical language between the subjects. The paintings propose a form of benevolence and compassion that speaks across time and place. In ‘What we have seen’, two women stand together, one behind the other, one woman’s hand gently placed on the other’s shoulder, both gazing upward with expressions that could be shock, fear or astonishment. In the two paintings, ‘To have and to hold’, and ‘From this day on’, the care within the relationship speaks of a profound psychological and spiritual bond.