Abandoned Shells and Hollowed-Out Dreams: Marie Schubert and “Exuvie” at Anton Janizewski Berlin
When you type “exuvia” into a search engine, the first images filling the screen are transparent insect shells long abandoned by the creature inside. Life has withdrawn, yet the sadness and trace of a former existence still hang upon that inanimate remnant. Artist Marie Schubert turns her focus to these left-behind husks, shells, and hollowed-out cultural objects with her solo exhibition “Exuvie,” taking place between September 11 and October 31, 2026, at the Anton Janizewski gallery in Berlin.
In societal conventions, we tend to always search for an ultimate “essence” beneath the surface of objects and humans. Schubert targets the legendary 1967 British sports car Lotus Elan +2 to test this notion. Stripping away the engine, transmission, and seats of this car—considered a symbol of aristocracy, masculinity, and high status when launched in its era—she turns it into a completely empty shell. Exhibited as a sandblasted, translucent, porous, and fragile object, this sculpture instantly lays bare how power and status can turn into such a hollow dream.
A similar story of exuviation unfolds in Schubert’s drawings on paper and frameless acrylic glass boxes. Glistening scales of armor, slashed-open bags, and frogs sunbathing beside empty pill packages construct surreal universes governed by unconventional rules. Just as in her bronze sculpture titled Marie-Antoinette or in the floating dollar symbols, familiar objects of daily life suddenly become alienated. Standing before all these hollowed-out cultural remains, the exhibition prompts us to ask: When the essence is gone, isn’t the remaining shell enough?
Opening on the evening of Thursday, September 10, as part of Berlin Art Week, the exhibition stands as one of September’s most original stops for those wishing to discover that fragile shell on the surface of objects and images.
