©Thomas Lannes Courtesy MASSIMODECARLO.
VERTIGO
In dialogue with Alexis Rockman
FVTVRIST Magazine // 13 January 2025
Text by Anna S.
The Oxford Dictionary defines vertigo as “a sensation of whirling and loss of balance, associated particularly with looking down from a great height.” In Vertigo, presented at Massimo de Carlo Pièce Unique, Alexis Rockman reclaims this condition as a method of seeing. Long associated with ecological narratives and natural history painting, the artist here abandons distance and overview. The viewer is placed on the ground, looking upward. FVTVRIST Magazine spoke with Alexis Rockman shortly after his return from Paris, following the opening of the exhibition, to discuss vertigo as both physical condition and pictorial strategy, the inversion of perspective, and what this exhibition reveals about the direction of his practice.
When did you first experience vertigo, and how did it alter your perception in that moment?
I was in Ecuador, in the Andes Mountains. It was nighttime, and I went out looking for frogs. I looked down a trail and suddenly realized I couldn’t go any further. I thought, I’m going to fall. It was a really unsettling revelation. That was the first time I clearly understood that I had vertigo. Looking back, there were probably signs before, but that was the moment it became undeniable. This was about two and a half years ago. When I returned, I went through a series of medical tests, and nothing conclusive showed up.
At what point did that physical sensation become something you felt you could paint from?
It didn’t translate directly. For me, it became an idea rather than a literal subject. The real challenge today, when painting landscapes or ecological themes, is how to do it without falling into something familiar or fatigued. The horizon line, in particular, is always something you have to confront. In earlier work, I often dealt with that by using viewpoints above and below water or ground level. What interested me here was the loss of orientation. Cinema handles this extremely well. You have transitional moments where you don’t quite know where you are. Directors like Terrence Malick use that language beautifully. I realized vertigo offered a similar opportunity in painting. I couldn’t think of many painters who had really explored this perspective. Georgia O’Keeffe did a few works in the teens and twenties, and although she wasn’t a central reference for me growing up, that was the first time I thought, this is something I can use.
Humboldt Forest is one of the central works in the exhibition. Can you speak about this painting and its role within Vertigo?
When the gallery approached me about the exhibition and shared works they were interested in, I saw it as an opportunity to explore the night sky more deeply. I was thinking about pictorialism through omission. When you have a star field and a silhouette in front of it, very little information is needed to imply presence. It’s elegant and powerful. I had made a large painting in 1995 after a trip to Guyana, where most of the image worked in this way. That painting is about eight feet tall, and I had always wanted to return to that visual language. With Humboldt Forest, the subject of redwood trees felt right. These are among the oldest living organisms on Earth. Conceptually and pictorially, it felt like the right place to work from. It’s also a landscape I know personally, having spent time in that part of California.
Throughout the exhibition, the point of view is inverted. What interested you in shifting the perspective from looking at the landscape to looking up from within it?
It places the viewer in a position that can feel euphoric but also unsettling. You don’t quite know where you are. Are you lying comfortably in the grass, or are you in your grave, looking up for the last time? That ambiguity mattered to me.
There’s a film by Carl Theodor Dreyer, Vampyr, from 1931, that had a strong influence. There’s a sequence where the main character is alive inside a coffin and sees the world from below as he’s carried to the cemetery. I’ve been obsessed with that image since I was young, and it definitely fed into this way of thinking about perspective.
Alexis Rockman working on Humboldt Forest
©Dorothy Spears l Courtesy of the artist.
Installation views, Vertigo, Paris, 2026.
© Thomas Lannes. Courtesy MASSIMODECARLO.
Installation views, Vertigo, Paris, 2026. © Thomas Lannes. Courtesy MASSIMODECARLO.
These works feel quiet but emotionally charged. What emotional state accompanied you while making Vertigo?
Making work is never a single emotional state. It takes time. You start with an idea and an inner connection you’re trying to hold onto, and then you move back and forth, constantly asking whether the image actually expresses what you want it to. Each painting takes weeks to complete, so the emotional register shifts throughout the process.
Pièce Unique is a focused and concentrated exhibition format. How did this context shape the way you prepared for Vertigo, both conceptually and in the studio?
The scale of the works the gallery was interested in felt exactly right for the space. I also wanted to make additional paintings so that, even though the exhibition is small, there’s a sense of variation within consistency. All the major works are the same size. You move through the space and think, wait, is this the same painting? But it isn’t. The format remains fixed, while the image shifts your sense of place and orientation.
Paris is currently covered in snow, while the works in Vertigo evoke spring and summer. Does this contrast affect how you experience the exhibition now?
It feels like an oasis. On the day of the opening, it was snowing outside the gallery. You walk in from the cold, and suddenly you’re surrounded by dense vegetation and light. That contrast felt very strong to me.
How did it feel to see the exhibition in Paris?
It was a real thrill. I grew up going to France, and wanting to be an artist largely came from visiting the Louvre. This is my first exhibition in Paris. I’ve shown many times in Europe, but never in France, which always felt strange. Being here now feels very meaningful.
Installation views, Vertigo, Paris, 2026. © Thomas Lannes. Courtesy MASSIMODECARLO.
About MASSIMODECARLO Pièce Unique
Massimo de Carlo Pièce Unique is a gallery space dedicated to focused, carefully edited exhibitions. Rather than presenting large-scale shows, Pièce Unique invites artists to concentrate on a small number of works and a single idea, allowing each exhibition to be experienced slowly and with attention.
The format encourages clarity and intimacy, creating space for one artistic statement at a time. By reducing scale and excess, Pièce Unique allows works to be seen more closely, and the artist’s intentions to remain clear and undiluted. It is a model of exhibition-making that strongly resonates with us.
