Julius von Bismarck One Small Blindness, 2026

Julius von Bismarck's work consists of wooden panels into which plants and animals have been pressed using an innovative process, held in brass frames. Built as a triptych, its two side panels open and close, recalling an altarpiece.

One Small Blindness depicts a group of figures that gather at a still body of water, looking at their own reflections. The landscape, though idyllic at first glance, has tipped into crisis: columns of smoke rise on the horizon, and none of the figures turn toward them. Some sit on white plastic chairs; others appear to merge with the landscape itself. One chair, empty, faces the fire alone. The work takes Edward Burne-Jones's The Mirror of Venus (1898) as its starting point. In that Pre-Raphaelite work, a ring of beautiful girls dressed in lovely draperies look into a reflecting pond amidst a rocky landscape.