Ilenia

“You know and I know, I know and you know, you know and I know, we know and they know, they know and we know, they know and I know, they know and they know you know and you know I know and I know.”

– Portrait of Man Ray, Gertrude Stein

You know and I know, I know and you know brings together eleven artists whose practices centre on portraiture as an intimate, psychological, and social act. Titled after Gertrude Stein’s word painting Portrait of Man Ray, the exhibition defines portraiture as a composite of perception, relational intimacy, and historical context.

Similarly to the artists who gathered in Stein’s Paris salons in the early twentieth century, the artists in this exhibition turn their gaze toward those closest to them: fellow artists, friends, lovers, collaborators and pop culture icons. These are portraits born of proximity rather than distance, shaped by shared time, emotional entanglement, and mutual influence. Collectively, the works suggest that portraiture is not only a reflection of an individual sitter, but also a record of a social ecosystem and the conditions that produce it.

Across painting, photography, drawing and lithography, the exhibition reveals portraits that are psychologically charged and often quietly unsettling. Subjects appear not as fixed identities, but as unstable presences filtered through desire, memory, power, and affection.

The exhibition situates contemporary portraiture within a historical continuum, tracing a line from Stein’s salons to a present moment in which artists once again use their immediate circles as sites of inquiry. What emerges is a collective portrait not only of individuals, but of a community that reflects the social, emotional, and cultural tensions of its time.