The exhibition READ in Basel, Switzerland, presents new works by Swiss artist Raphael Bottazzini. The exhibition, centered on Raphael Bottazzini’s “Expectation Paintings,” explores the interplay between names, identity, and perception. Drawing from Shakespeare’s idea in “Romeo and Juliet” that names do not define the essence of things, the series challenges how we form expectations and judgments based on names and preconceptions rather than true understanding. These pairings create a tension that prompts viewers to question connections, identities, and the blurred lines between reality and fiction. Bottazzini’s work investigates how names shape our perceptions, trigger personal associations, and reflect the artist’s and viewer’s internal experiences, ultimately probing the construction of identity and its influence on our worldview. The exhibition also features Bottazzini’s works Garden Palette, Studio Chair, Blueprint Identity, and Bank & Stapel.
Raphael Bottazzini: READ. Apartment Exhibition. Basel (Switzerland), June 21, 2025.
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Exhibition texts:
A name alone is not enough. Without context, it loses its anchorage and becomes an abstract sign – legible, but not tangible. In its repetitiveness and interchangeability, the name reveals a paradoxical emptiness: it seems to name something, but what it means remains undefined. What happens when a name – a supposedly identity-forming element – is detached from its social, biographical or historical function? The canvas becomes the projection surface of a reduced gesture: the act of naming without designation, a language without statement – in the end: abstract art.
Studio Chair:
The dots of oil paint on the Studio Chair object are not the result of a chaotic or instinctive process, but the expression of a deliberate gesture. Their placement follows a carefulness and clarity that also underlies classical oil painting. This reduced placement lends the work a balance by showing a rational intention and at the same time distancing itself from the idea of random patches of color.
Garden Palette:
Claude Monet dedicated a large part of his artistic life to the care and design of his garden – a place that he not only painted, but deliberately created as a walk-in, growing work of art. For him, nature was not just a subject, but a medium. The garden became a canvas on which light, color and time were reflected. The flowers bloomed, withered and changed with the seasons – and Monet captured this change in a painterly gesture. Raphael Bottazzini‘s work Garden Palett now builds a bridge from the romanticized past to the globalized present.
Blueprint Identity: Anne-Sophie Dürig, Jacqueline Buser
When viewed individually, the truth shifts almost imperceptibly: here a hairstyle changes, there the proportions deviate slightly. No two images are exactly alike. And yet all these variations are based on a common blueprint – a “blueprint” that helps to intuitively recognize the identity. The truth becomes fluid and our recognition begins.
Bank & Stapel:
Every month, the bench receives a new piece of wood with two names. When one is replaced, the old wood is placed in a pile and becomes part of a sculpture. Basically, the bench wants to ask questions: What is allowed in public spaces? Who may be named with whom? Is an evaluation possible without context, and what is a name?
Expectation Paintings: Susanne Hartmann, Björk – Björk, Susanne Hartmann (SHB, BSH)
The picture entitled “SHB, BSH” consists of two large parts, each 1.85 meters high and 1.45 meters wide. Both parts are covered with white cotton fabric, separated in the middle and sewn together. The first canvas has “Susanne Hartmann” at the top and “Björk” underneath. On the second canvas, the order is reversed. In the upper half of the picture the names are written in charcoal pencil, in the lower half there are abstract, line-like traces of charcoal; the name “Björk” perhaps refers to the well-known artist, or to an unspecified person. Similarly, the name “Susanne Hartmann” represents an ambiguity whose identity cannot be determined until the artist reveals further information. Without this context, ‘Susanne Hartmann’ and ‘Björk’ lose their meaning and blend seamlessly into the abstract overall picture as empty signs.
Julia Roberts, Clark Kent
Urs Fischer, Bugs Bunny
Patricia Smith, Miss Piggy
Kanye West, Betty Boop
MJ, ET
Raphael Bottazzini: “Expectation Paintings” (by Niels ten Brink)
‘What’s in a name?’ William Shakespeare in the second act of ‘Romeo and Juliet’ has his main character desperately whisper out into the night. ‘That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet,’ the verses continue.
To Shakespeare, it is neither name nor external designation that determines the nature, the existence of things. Yet, our expectations are linked to these; we judge and are judged not based on what is seen or learnt but rather are dominated by our prejudices. The names we encounter in everyday life are not aptronyms. They do not reveal any character traits as Shakespeare’s Malvolio, meaning ‘I want bad things,’ or Benvolio, ‘I want good things,’ do. Our names and designations do not convey any profound revelations about their bearers. Nonetheless, we are guided by our prior knowledge, the tension between our own experience and externally influenced expectations.
‘Expectation Paintings’ then. Names are coarsely written in charcoal on the face of a rather large, rough-textured white canvas of 145 x 185 cm, fleetingly, almost like a quickly scribbled note. The lines have been traced repeatedly, the charcoal blurred and rubbed off, revealing the texture of the canvas. This handwriting and the traces of work are simultaneously soaked in the artist’s personality.
The first work in the series reveals the series’ underlying pattern of combining a real person with a fictional character. Here: Julia Roberts—actress, adaptable, versatile. Someone we are supposedly so familiar with through her roles that we easily forget the real person behind her, who is also unavailable to us. Do you really mean this Julia Roberts—without any further context? And there is Clark Kent. The seemingly real name of a fictional character who again has another name, an alter ego, within that very fiction—Superman. Or is Kent rather Superman’s alter ego?
Above all, though, the question arises as to why these two of all people actually do share space on this canvas. By presenting us with their names, formal and topical tension is created between the artist and the viewer.
Basel-based artist Raphael Bottazzini describes his works of the ‘Expectation Paintings’ series as “cryptic.” Yet, the combination of the works’ titles and the names presented to us in them suggests to the viewer a playful triggering of their own expectations in the face of two names. And then exactly what Bottazzini wants to achieve, what happens inside him, happens: ‘The picture activates something inside me. I can’t do anything about it.’ As viewers, we wonder about connections and relationships, puzzling over whether the artist perhaps sees or recognizes a connection between the names that is hidden or unknown to us. The picture thus creates a bond between us and Bottazzini; we involuntarily experience his own activation and make it our own.
Bottazzini’s oeuvre is driven by the thought of how our perception of identity is shaped, constructed by the search for the larger and smaller markers of its manifestation. His works repeatedly return to this fundamental human question, as it is also a fixed point of our perception of others and, thus, our own positioning in this world. In his previous work ‘Curated Seeding,’ the artist already connected real people who were strangers in real life so that they could form a picture of each other. In his ongoing ‘Bank and Stack,’ the artist randomly connects the names of real people with each other by having them share proximity, initiating thought and conversation.
The concept of ‘Expectation Paintings’ then just seems to be a logical next step: On their meta-level, the boundaries between reality and fiction, construction, and our perception of identities blur even further.
