Till and Léopold Rabus: Swiss Brothers' Surreal Paintings at Saint-Cyprien

The exhibition 'Till et Léopold Rabus' at Collections de Saint-Cyprien in France, running from October 13, 2006 to January 21, 2007, introduced the work of two Swiss brothers born in 1975 and 1977 respectively. Coming from a long family tradition of painters, Till and Léopold Rabus live between Neuchâtel and Paris, where they share studios. Till Rabus appropriates vacation photos found online, adding strange details that disrupt the serenity of the scenes—such as a Papuan dancer in 'Karine et Michel' or tourists with rolled-back eyes in 'Étrange Beach Party,' evoking the uncanny quality of American hyperrealists from the late 1960s. His large-format paintings create an unsettling atmosphere. Léopold Rabus works more subtly and disturbingly, presenting interior scenes on white backgrounds with small, thin bodies and oversized heads, as if seen through a fisheye lens. These images aggregate memories and family photographic heritage, producing a waking nightmare sensation where motifs collide—a child's room, a forest, Alice's rabbit. Critics compare his work to Pat Andrea, Béatrice Cussol, and Philippe Perrot, noting the use of strangeness, unreal pink flesh, bodily fragments, and truncated memories that leave stories unfinished and violence ambiguous.