With Same old, same old, Berlinde De Bruyckere – Belgian artist born in 1964 – returns to one of the most radical questions at the core of her practice: the persistence of the body as a site of conflict, memory and transformation. Hosted by Galleria Continua in San Gimignano, the exhibition also takes the form of an extract and reworking of the project presented by the artist at Frieze Masters, extending and deepening within a more intimate and contemplative context some of the trajectories that emerged on that occasion. Rather than a simple transposition, the exhibition operates as a new critical montage, capable of revealing latent connections between works and recurring themes.
Berlinde De Bruyckere, “Same old, same old”, 2025, exhibition view Galleria Continua, San Gimignano. Courtesy: the artist and GALLERIA CONTINUA, Photo: Ela Bialkowska, OKNO Studio
The title suggests repetition not as stasis, but as accumulation. In De Bruyckere’s work, the return of images, postures and materials does not signal an exhaustion of language, but rather the impossibility of definitively archiving trauma. Covered, compressed, bent or absent bodies continue to resurface as symptoms of a history that refuses to stop producing wounds. Same old, same old thus becomes a bitter acknowledgment: the major narratives of violence, crisis and loss do not belong to the past, but cyclically re-emerge, infiltrating the present. The exhibition brings together works spanning nearly four decades of practice, making evident how De Bruyckere’s work is marked by a profound coherence, which is more ethical rather than stylistic.
Berlinde De Bruyckere, “Same old, same old”, 2025, exhibition view Galleria Continua, San Gimignano. Courtesy: the artist and GALLERIA CONTINUA, Photo: Ela Bialkowska, OKNO Studio
Her hybrid bodies – human, animal, vegetal – never present themselves as completed representations, but as organisms in a state of becoming, suspended between protection and vulnerability. The use of materials such as blankets, lead, wood or animal skin does not respond to a formal investigation, but to a symbolic necessity: each material retains a memory, an emotional temperature, a political tension. In this sense, the body that emerges from the works is never merely biological. It is a social body, exposed to dynamics of control, exclusion and care. The recurring presence of structures such as cages, supports, vitrines, or trestles does not function as a simple display device, but as a conceptual extension of the work itself: what supports, contains or immobilizes the body becomes an integral part of its condition. Even when the body is absent, as in beds or empty spaces, its lack intensifies the perception of a latent presence, turning absence into an active element. Drawing occupies a central role in the exhibition, not as a preparatory phase but as a space where thought condenses. In works on paper, wings, cages, and angelic figures appear as omens, anticipating themes that also traverse the more recent production. The angel, in particular, does not appear as a salvific figure, but as an ambiguous image: fragile, imprisoned, often stripped of any transcendent rhetoric. It is a body that promises the possibility of transformation, yet without offering consolation.
Berlinde De Bruyckere, “Same old, same old”, 2025, exhibition view Galleria Continua, San Gimignano. Courtesy: the artist and GALLERIA CONTINUA, Photo: Ela Bialkowska, OKNO Studio
This layered reading of De Bruyckere’s practice finds further articulation in the exhibition catalogue, to which Valentino Catricalà has contributed, offering a reflection that intertwines body, technology, and memory as critical devices of the contemporary. As Catricalà writes, «The body of De Bruyckere is not only a physical, cultural and spiritual entity, but also a political act: the interpretation of a new social body that exists in a delicate balance between absence and presence, between a given physical structure and continuous metamorphosis». His contribution expands the interpretative field, situating the artist’s work within a broader dialogue with the cultural and symbolic transformations of our time, without reducing it to a merely iconographic dimension. De Bruyckere’s practice thus occupies a zone of friction between horror and tenderness, violence and care, avoiding any symbolic simplification. Her works do not illustrate pain; they render it tangible, physical, without ever spectacularizing it. In this precarious balance lies the strength of her work: in the refusal of a pacified narrative, in the decision to remain within the wound.
Berlinde De Bruyckere, “Same old, same old”, 2025, exhibition view Galleria Continua, San Gimignano. Courtesy: the artist and GALLERIA CONTINUA, Photo: Ela Bialkowska, OKNO Studio
Within the spaces of Galleria Continua, Same old, same old takes on the character of an insistent meditation on the impossibility of separating the body from history. There is no redemption or catharsis, but a demand for attention: to look, to pause, to acknowledge. In a present marked by both new and recurring forms of crisis, De Bruyckere forces us to return to what seems already seen, only to discover that nothing has truly been resolved.
Info:
Berlinde De Bruyckere. Same old, same old
24/01 – 19/04/2026
Galleria Continua
Via del Castello 11, San Gimignano (SI)
www.galleriacontinua.com
Art Curator and Art Advisor, graduated in Visual Arts and Cultural Mediation, with Master in Curatorial Practices, born in 1995, lives in Naples. He collaborates with Galleries and Independent Spaces, his research is mainly focused on Emerging Painting, with a careful and inclined gaze also on other forms of aesthetic language.
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