.jpg)
UFO is an icon of absence.
The Wig proposes artworks and sculptures that stage encounters of the third—or unknown—kind. Loosely drawn from UFO phenomena and surrounding cultural narratives, the presentation spans sculpture, painting and conceptual works.
Absence is central to UFO mythologies: wherever there is emptiness, memory invents its ghosts. We’re drawn to the phenomenology of nearing something unidentifiable, and the impulse to make contact. Some works channel minimalist or sci-fi aesthetics; others show how science fiction seeps into visual culture, politics, media, entertainment…
UFOs reveal unresolved human emotion projected into the ether: Bigfoot in forests, saucers in skies, unnameable beings across galaxies. These projections often mirror humanity’s own impulses, violent, extractive, colonial. What to do with them?
Beyond strange encounters, the UFO persists as an icon of absence. A placeholder for what may have been lost, stolen, or never quite revealed or resolved. As Camus wrote, we ask infinite questions into the cosmos, and hear almost nothing back.
UFOs reveal unresolved human emotion projected into the ether: Bigfoot in forests, saucers in skies, unnameable beings across galaxies. These projections often mirror humanity’s own impulses, violent, extractive, colonial. What to do with them?
Beyond strange encounters, the UFO persists as an icon of absence. A placeholder for what may have been lost, stolen, or never quite revealed or resolved. As Camus wrote, we ask infinite questions into the cosmos, and hear almost nothing back.
The Wig present works by Clémentine Adou, Robert Barry, Mathis Gasser, Sophie Gogl, Jason Hirata, Hoover bags, Nandi Loaf, Neon-light entity, Paul Niedermayer, Pulp Fiction MacGuffin, Richard Sides, Philipp Simon, Angharad Williams.
Clementine Adou (b. 1988, Paris) lives and works in Paris. Solo and duo exhibitions include Xmas, Bains-Douches, Alençon (2024); Daddy long legs’ hands, Tonus, Paris (2023); AUTO (with Julien Monnerie), DOC, Paris (2021); One Shot, Palette Terre, Paris (2020); and Sans sommeil, 76,4, Brussels (2019). Clementine has participated in numerous group exhibitions including Kunstverein Freiburg, Fondation Pernod Ricard, La Salle de Bains (Lyon), Treize (Paris), Bel Ami (Los Angeles), Shivers Only (Paris), and High Art (Paris).
Robert Barry (b. 1936, New York) has spent nearly sixty years expanding the parameters of what an artwork can be. Since the 1960s, he has worked with invisible materials such as carrier waves, inert gas, and radiation—matters that exist physically but elude the human senses. Over time, Barry’s practice shifted toward using words as open-ended prompts for thought.
Mathis Gasser (b. 1984, Zürich, Switzerland) lives and works in London. Selected exhibitions include Objects in the Sky, MAMCO, Geneva (2023); Heroes and Ghosts, Schiefe Zähne, Berlin (2022); Parallels Part 1: Astral Border, CAN Centre d’Art, Neuchâtel (2022); Breaching, Weiss Falk, Basel (2021); Hergest: Trem (with Angharad Williams), Swiss Institute, New York (2021); We Never Sleep, Schirn Kunsthalle, Frankfurt am Main (2020); Structures and Institutions II, Ginerva Gambino, Cologne (2019); and Mathis Gasser & Tobias Hantmann, Lady Helen, London (2019).
Sophie Gogl (b. 1992, Kitzbühel, Austria) lives and works in Vienna. Solo and duo exhibitions include Shit Show, Derosia, New York (2025); Sophie Gogl & Marina Sula, Diana, Milan; The Opening, Neuer Kunstverein Wien (both 2024); Die knusprige Nichte, Kunsthaus Glarus, Switzerland (2023); Angharad Williams and Sophie Gogl, Francis Irv, New York (2022); and Jars, KOW, Berlin (2021). Sophie has participated in numerous group exhibitions including Julia Stoschek Foundation (Düsseldorf), Kölnischer Kunstverein, Belvedere 21 (Vienna), Kunsthalle Friart Fribourg, and Kunsthalle Bern.
Jason Hirata (b. 1986, Seattle) lives and works in Princeton, NJ. Recent solo exhibitions include Dà a chi avaregia, Fanta-MLN, Milan (2024); Sometimes You're Both, 80WSE, New York (2020); Pelican, Svetlana, New York (2019) and 25 OCTOBER, 2015 — 12 MAY, 2019, Kunstverein Nürnberg (2019). His work has also been shown at Artists Space, Kai Matsumiya, CCS Bard, and Fall River MoCA in New York and Massachusetts, as well as Château Shatto (Los Angeles).
Nandi Loaf (b. 1991) lives and works in New York. Loaf investigates the existential state of the artist by implicating herself through the construction of the identity “Nandi Loaf: the artist.” Her hedonistic exploration of this identity, what she calls “hyperparticipation”, moves between paintings, prints, acrylic sculptures, and home-built machines. Loaf’s works blur the lines between simulated and physical presence, centering the social and financial structures of exchange within the art world. Solo and duo exhibitions include Ever, King’s Leap, New York; 7, Profil, Paris (both 2024), WORSER, Room 3557, Los Angeles (2023); Third Solo Exhibition, King’s Leap, New York (2021). Selected group exhibitions include The Wig, Shore Gallery (Vienna), Jack Shainman Gallery (New York), Weatherproof (Chicago) and Kaje (New York).
Paul Niedermayer (b. 1989) is an artist living and working in Berlin. Selected solo and duo exhibitions include Wildlife, The Wig, Berlin (2025); [Door slams], Brasseries Atlas, Brussels (2024); It’s Always Off, Photography Exhibit, Zurich (2022); and Entspannungstropfen im Servicespülbecken, Sangt Hipolyt, Berlin (2022). She will open her first institutional solo exhibition at Kunstverein Freiburg in September 2025. Recent group exhibitions include Mink (Frankfurt am Main), Kunstverein Braunschweig, Kunstverein Bielefeld, Gauli Zitter (Brussels), and The Wig. Since 2023, she teaches in the photography department at the Academy of Fine Arts Leipzig.
Richard Sides (b. 1985, Rotherham, UK) is an artist and curator based in Berlin. His works explore contemporary ideas of meaning as an existential problem. These often manifest as environments that treat the exhibition as sites with their own obstructions and particularities to respond to. Recent solo and duo exhibitions include Psychology, Carlos / Ishikawa, London (2025); Years, KIN, Brussels (2025): Elections, Shore Gallery, Vienna (2024); Slow Dance (4) with Nicole-Antonia Spagnola, Stadtgalerie Bern (2023); Basic Vision, KOW, Berlin (2022); The Matrix, Schiefe Zähne, Berlin (2021); Dwelling, Kunstverein Braunschweig (2019) and PURE HATE, Liszt, Berlin (2017). Richard has participated in numerous group exhibitions including Kunsthalle Zurich, Bonner Kunstverein, Kunsthaus Glarus, Kunstverein Hannover, Atonal Berlin, Fluentum Berlin and Swiss Institute, New York.
Philipp Simon (b. 1987, Berlin, Germany) lives and works in Berlin. Recent solo exhibitions include Diesel-Only, Schiefe Zähne, Berlin (2023); Incomplete Nature, Kirchgasse Gallery, Steckborn (2022); The Big Picture, Schiefe Zähne, Berlin (2021); and a solo at 15 Orient Gallery, New York (2020). Group exhibitions include Modeling, Lo Brutto Stahl, Paris (2025); Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow Again, Binz39, Zürich (2024); Ruf/Simon, Lo Brutto Stahl, Paris (2024); and Slow Dance (3), Stadtgalerie Bern (2023). In 2024, Simon published his first sci-fi novel Natur.
Angharad Williams (b. Ynys Cybi, Wales) is an artist, writer, and performer whose work is concerned with the role of poetry in militarised societies. Recent solo exhibitions and performances include A Fire in the Sky – In response to Ull, Haus am Waldsee, Berlin (2025); The Bottom Dogs II, SIMIAN, Copenhagen (2025); Berlin Straße, Schiefe Zähne, Berlin (2024); New Technology, Fanta, Milan (2023); Eraser, Kunstverein Düsseldorf (2022); Picture the Others, Mostyn, Llandudno (2022); and High Horse, Kevin Space, Vienna (2021). Her first book Eraser was published by After8 Books, Paris (2023), and in summer 2025, she will release a limited 12” vinyl with Concentric Group, London & the Bauhaus Foundation, Dessau. Williams teaches on the Master’s program in Fine Art at Zürcher Hochschule der Künste, Zürich.