Louise Giovanelli: A Song of Ascents

‘A painting should be the beginning of something. The best paintings are those that endure in your mind – because there’s this sense of mystery to them.’ 

- Louise Giovanelli

Louise Giovanelli (b. 1993, London, UK) creates hypnotic paintings that radiate light. Her works regularly feature mysterious objects such as a closed pair of curtains, a shock of lustrous hair, or the reflective surface of a cocktail glass. Characters—often women—also appear, seemingly caught in a moment between reverence and despair, or about to reach a form of transcendence. Intimately cropped and cinematic in feel, her subject matter is deliberately ambiguous, and rendered with the analogue fuzziness of a memory or half-forgotten dream.

A Song of Ascents takes its title from a series of religious Psalms traditionally recited by pilgrims on their journey to sacred sites. For Giovanelli, the idea of ‘ascent’ reflects our human desire to reach heightened states of consciousness—whether through spiritual devotion, sensuality and love, intoxicating substances, the thrill of performance, or even horror. This journey unfolds in her paintings as an uncanny fusion of emotions, where exaggerated expressions, richly layered textures, and intense, colour-saturated imagery evoke both ecstasy and unease.

The exhibition features ten newly commissioned paintings alongside nine existing works; many are inspired by scenes from films, while some of the most recent paintings are created from photographs the artist has taken in working men’s clubs and theatres across the UK. These venues, often distinguished by modest stages, worn velvet curtains, and a unique blend of everyday informality and staged theatrics, are transformed through Giovanelli’s hand into sites of communal performance and escape. She highlights elements such as the voluptuous curtains, sagging with gravity, glittering sequinned fabrics, and focused spotlights to elevate these familiar spaces, giving them a sense of holiness.

Giovanelli’s paintings invite us to meet at a threshold where reality and imagination converge—a space charged with ambiguity, where each scene teeters between the sacred and the unsettling.

Louise Giovanelli: A Song of Ascents is organised in collaboration with HALLE FÜR KUNST Steiermark where the exhibition will be presented from June 28 - August 31, 2025.

About The Hepworth Wakefield 

The Hepworth Wakefield is an award-winning art gallery in the heart of Yorkshire (UK), named after Barbara Hepworth, one of the most important artists of the 20th century who was born and brought up in Wakefield. Designed by the acclaimed David Chipperfield Architects, the gallery has continued to present major exhibitions of the best international modern and contemporary art since its opening in 2011.

About the Artist

Louise Giovanelli (b. 1993, London, UK) lives and works in Manchester (UK). She completed her postgraduate studies at the Städelschule in Frankfurt am Main (DE) with professor Amy Sillman in 2020, after having earned a Bachelor’s Degree (B.A. Hons, Fine Art) at the Manchester School of Art, Manchester (UK) in 2015.

Solo exhibitions include: Here on Earth, White Cube Hong Kong (HK); Louise Giovanelli - Paintings 2019 - 2024, He Art Museum (HEM), Foshan (CN); Soothsay, GRIMM, New York, NY (US); Always Different, Always the Same, Moon Grove, Manchester (UK); Collection Spotlight: Louise Giovanelli, Grundy Art Gallery, Blackpool (UK); As If, Almost, White Cube, London (UK) and Auto-da-fé, GRIMM, New York, NY (US).

Giovanelli's work has been featured in numerous group exhibitions, including True Colors, AkzoNobel Art Foundation at Kunstmuseum, The Hague (NL); Good Morning, Midnight, The Courtauld Gallery, London (UK); Self-Portraits, GRIMM, New York, NY (US); In Focus, Centraal Museum, Utrecht (NL); The Sea, the Sky, a Window, Hill Art Foundation, New York, NY (US); In New York, Thinking of You, The FLAG Art Foundation, New York, NY (US) and The Kingfisher’s Wing, curated by Tom Morton, GRIMM, New York, NY (US).

Giovanelli’s work can be found in the collections of the AkzoNobel Art Foundation (NL); Asymmetry Art Foundation (UK); The Contemporary Art Foundation (JP); Hall Art Foundation (DE, US); The Hepworth Wakefield (UK); Hill Art Foundation (US); Institute of Contemporary Art, Miami, FL (US); Longlati Foundation (CN); Manchester Art Gallery Collection (UK); MOCA, Los Angeles, CA (US); The National Museum (NO); Sarow Gallery Collection (DE); The UK Government Art Collection (UK); Warrington Museum and Art Gallery (UK); Whitworth Art Gallery (UK); Yuz Museum Shanghai (CN) among others.

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