Caroline Achaintre: Extrazimmer

Through 4 July 2026, La Verrière, the Brussels exhibition space of the Fondation d’entreprise Hermès, presents Extrazimmer, a solo exhibition by Caroline Achaintre, curated by Joël Riff. The exhibition is in dialogue with pieces by Czech artist Anna Zemánková and sculptor Régis Jocteur Monrozier, as well as a text by Alsatian journalist and writer Simone Morgenthaler.

The exhibition title, Extrazimmer, borrows a German word for the spare room in a house, a flexible, pressure-free space that can be a guest room or simply an open space that can encourage creativity and comfort. The concept echoes Virginia Woolf’s A Room of One’s Own, and frames the show as a space of creative freedom and hospitality, two ideas central to both the artist’s practice and the curator’s approach.

Born in Toulouse in 1969 and raised in Germany, Achaintre studied metalwork before moving to London in 1998 and graduating from Goldsmiths College in 2003. For over two decades she has worked across tufted wool, ceramics, ink drawing and other materials, producing a cast of hybrid, mask-like figures that hover somewhere between ancient ritual costumes, anthropomorphism and science fiction. Achaintre has said that making her tapestries is like painting with wool, colours mixing and overlapping in a very expressionist way. There is an energy, a force that come through the large-scale works. The tufting technique, which involves continuously threading yarn through a canvas backing, gives Achaintre’s hanging works their distinctively dense, shaggy surfaces. From a distance they read as faces or creatures; up close, they dissolve into texture and colour.

The centrepiece of the exhibition is Gobbler (2025), a monumental hand-tufted wool tapestry measuring 350 by 440 centimetres, originally shown at Art Basel Unlimited 2025. Its presentation at La Verrière marks its first extended public viewing. Surrounding it are a number of new tufted pieces produced specifically for this exhibition, among them Sprite, Echo, Feathers and Bat-Frog, as well as a selection of ceramics.

Curator Joel Riff has presented several exhibitions as “augmented solos,” in which works by other artists dip into the solo show as a complement and further dialogue to the artist’s work on view. Here, Czech artist Anna Zemánková (1908–1986), a key figure in art brut, is represented by drawings and paper-cuts made during her early-morning sessions between four and seven a.m., highly detailed explorations of organic forms, flora and composite figures. They echo the sense of mystery and alchemy that is found within Achaintre’s tapestries and ceramics. Brussels-based sculptor Régis Jocteur Monrozier contributes furniture-sculptures that serve as physical supports for some of Achaintre’s pieces, blurring the line between functional object and artwork. Alsatian journalist and writer Simone Morgenthaler adds a newly commissioned text.

La Verrière is open Tuesday to Saturday, 12 to 6 p.m., with free admission and daily guided visits.

@fondationhermes