Playdate Susan Te Kahurangi King & Philip Emde

Susan Te Kahurangi King (b. 1951, Te Aroha, NZ) and Philip Emde (b. 1976, Mannheim, DE) present their unfolding worlds in the exhibition Playdate at Ruttkowski;68 in New York.

King’s power of speech famously declined at a young age, then dried up entirely. As a child, she began drawing prolifically on scraps of paper that came to hand. Her inventive, evolving drawings incorporate observations of her surroundings—including favorite comic book characters, animals, logos, landmarks, and household items.

Similarly, Emde paints what is around him in his studio, which doubles as an archive for his extensive collection of stuffed-toy animals. His works also offer densely packed scenes fashioned from abstracted and deconstructed bodies and things.

Although arising from very different life experiences, King and Emde both playfully conjure memories, as they access, process, and translate their perceptions of the world, which are juxtaposed and shown together for the first time in this exhibition. 

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