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Jenny Saville Opens New Exhibition in Venice Showcasing Latest Works
British artist Jenny Saville has unveiled her newest paintings in a Venice exhibition running through November. The show follows a recent retrospective in Fort Worth that spanned three decades of her figurative art. Saville discussed her inspirations and views on the art market in an interview.
Apr 26, 9:29 AM·1m read1 source
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British artist Jenny Saville's latest exhibition opened in Venice this weekend, featuring her newest work at the Ca' Pesaro International Gallery of Modern Art in Italy, where it will run through November. The exhibition comes after a recent retrospective at the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth, titled 'Jenny Saville: The Anatomy of Painting,' which exhibited more than three decades of her work and focused on arresting heads, most of them female.
That show has since closed.
In her Oxford, England studio, colossal heads with luminous faces line the walls, reflecting Saville's approach to portraiture. ' Saville's breakthrough arrived in the early 1990s with her self-portrait 'Propped,' which later sold for more than $12 million at auction. Collector Charles Saatchi spotted 'Propped' at her art school degree show and commissioned more works.
' Saville drew inspiration from artists who painted the body, including Freud, Bacon, Auerbach, Picasso, Degas, Egon Schiele, and De Kooning. She was also drawn to old master painters like Titian and Velasquez. From her first solo show, the painting 'Planned' depicts a torso marked up for liposuction.
' When asked if she finds it gratifying that her paintings sell in the millions, Saville replied, 'I find a studio is the purest space for me, and I leave all of that at the door. ' On whether she would spend millions of pounds to buy a painting, Saville laughed and said, 'I've never thought about that! Of course it's absurd.
' Images in the exhibitions are © Jenny Saville. DACS 2026; Courtesy: Gagosian. Additional photos include © Jenny Saville. DACS 2026; Photo: Irene Fanizza. Courtesy: Fondazione Musei Civici di Venezia, and © Jenny Saville.
