Wether Adam and Eve, depictions of marriage, or the abduction of Europa: the play of gender- specific power relations is a recurring theme in Maria Lassnig's paintings. Here, the seemingly neutral title Mann und Frau (Man and Woman) is countered by expressive yet still figurative imagery: a fight between two bodies is performed on the canvas as battleground. Both figures are separated like two pieces once connected, one expressing dominance over the other through visual signifiers such as color and size. Similar to a joint that aims to push a massive thigh forward and is ready to attack, the larger figure pushes the soft other to the edge of the frame. The scenery is reminiscient of a bullfight - a motif that that surfaces throughout art history in the paintings of Picasso and Goya, for example, signifying struggle and contrast. The question of how to read the depicted dynamics in Lassnig's work is deliberately left open: Do we see a representation of oppression or emancipation?

"But what do we mean by a bodily sensation? [...] And how much vivisection does an art tolerate, as much as love?"
- Maria Lassnig