Viewing Chantal Joffe: I Remember at Victoria Miro

Chantal Joffe’s exhibition of new, large-scale paintings has just been unveiled at Victoria Miro’s Wharf Road gallery. The works see the painter revisit the 1970s through the family photo album. It is an emotional and evocative journey into the past, contemplating themes of memory, loss, time and the delicate dynamics of family life.

Joffe’s late parents were South African and migrated to the US, where she was born, to escape repercussions for their anti-apartheid activism. The photographs capture the early years of their life in New England, familiar scenes of festivities, birthdays, Christmas, births, holidays, fancy dress – but also the occasional imperfect moment where something is off, sometimes suggested in Joffe’s mother’s gaze, such as a painting where her three daughters sit on the lap of another younger woman.

The work continues Joffe’s persistent interest in painting from photographs, in family and the mysterious ways memory works. “These paintings are a sort of memoir of my childhood and of my family, an attempt at a kind of time travel. When I am making them, it’s almost as if I am existing in that past.” The artist said.