Kottie Paloma's Grotesque Hybrids at Andrea Festa Fine Art, Rome

Kottie Paloma (Los Angeles, 1974) presents a solo exhibition at Andrea Festa Fine Art in Rome, featuring paintings that blend abstraction with rebellious figuration. The works incorporate collage, cubist and synthetic traits reminiscent of Picasso's Guernica, as well as influences from the Neuen Wilden, A.R. Penck, and Jean-Michel Basquiat. Paloma's technique involves painting on paper cutouts that are pressed onto canvas, leaving visible tears. The imagery includes anatomical sections, symbols, and allusions to World War I violence, echoing German Expressionists like Otto Dix. The artist's style is described as an oxymoronic mix of impetuous instincts, macabre taste, and cartoonish irony. Paloma moved to Alzenau, a small wine village in northern Bavaria that attracted bankers from Frankfurt. The exhibition is titled 'Ominus, Slow, Burn' and was photographed by Sveva Angeletti. The review was written by Giorgia Basili for Artribune.