Manon Wertenbroek
Manon Wertenbroek is a young Swiss-Dutch visual artist whose work was exhibited in May 2022 at the Studio des Acacias for the first group show of Reiffers Initiatives, titled “DES CORPS LIBRES – Une jeune scène française”. The artist was born in 1991 in Lausanne, Switzerland, and lives and works in Paris. She graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in Visual Communication from ECAL (École Cantonale d’Art de Lausanne) in 2014. In her sculptures and installations, Manon Wertenbroek explores the presence of the body without ever representing it explicitly.
Manon Wertenbroek is participating in the fifth edition of the Reiffers Art Prize, Tinkering with the unknown.
Wounds of the mind - Exhibition view of the Reiffers Initiatives Prize 2026 "Tinkering with the unknown"
Manon Wertenbroek, 2026
Neck breeze - Exhibition view of the Reiffers Initiatives Prize 2026 "Tinkering with the unknown"
Manon Wertenbroek, 2026
Tangible loss, luscious care - Exhibition view of the Reiffers Initiatives Prize 2026 "Tinkering with the unknown"
Manon Wertenbroek, 2026
Exhibition view of the Reiffers Art Prize 2022 "DES CORPS LIBRES - Une jeune scène française"
Manon Wertenbroek,
Exhibition view of the Reiffers Art Prize 2022 "DES CORPS LIBRES - Une jeune scène française"
Manon Wertenbroek,
Exhibition view of the Reiffers Art Prize 2022 "DES CORPS LIBRES - Une jeune scène française"
Manon Wertenbroek, 2022Biography
Through forms and the tension of materials, her works evoke fragmented corporealities and identities, revealing surfaces where interior and exterior come into friction. In her practice, skin appears as a central motif: a sensitive membrane, both protective and permeable, that filters, contains, and connects.
It is not conceived as a watertight boundary but as an active interface where biological, sensory, social, and psychic exchanges take place—an open space where a continuous relationship with others and the environment unfolds. Her recent solo and duo exhibitions include “In guts and head,” Rose Easton, London (2026); “Home Auto-Psy,” Lo Brutto Stahl, Paris (2024); “Wertenbroek/Wray,” with Randy Wray, Lo Brutto Stahl, Paris (2023); and “Refaire corps,” with Loredana Sperini, Lighthouse, Zurich (2023). Her work has also been shown in group exhibitions at institutions such as Muzeum Susch; Musée cantonal des Beaux-Arts, Lausanne; Swiss Cultural Center, Paris; Zuzeum Art Center, Riga; Foam Museum, Amsterdam; Istituto Svizzero, Rome; and within the framework of the Swiss Art Awards, among others.
In 2017, Wertenbroek received the Swiss Art Award from the Federal Office of Culture. She has also been awarded the Swiss Design Award and the Pro Helvetia Prize. In 2018, she completed a one-year residency at the Swiss Institute in Rome. More recently, she participated in residencies at the Sigg Art Foundation in AlUla (2023) and at the Pavillon Southway, Marseille (2022). Her work is included in several public and private collections, notably the Foam Museum in Amsterdam, Zuzeum Art Center in Riga, the City of Lausanne Art Collection, and Bank Vontobel in Zurich.
Texts
“The organic art of Manon Wertenbroek sublimates the great taboos of the human body” by Matthieu Jacquet
— Numéro, 2021
“In 1974, the psychoanalyst Didier Anzieu formulated for the first time the concept of the “self-skin”. According to this skilful metaphor, the palpable surface of the skin retaining the interior of the body would reflect that, more abstract, of the “ego” enveloping the psychic apparatus: any attack on the skin would then become an attack on the self and on the precious content. that it contains. If the analogy of the skin-ego is confined to psychoanalysis, Manon Wertenbroek seems, fifty years after its theorization, to unconsciously give it shape. In her works, this young Swiss-Dutch visual artist systematically materializes the skin without giving it body, detached from its carnal support. On a vertical zipper meticulously glued to the wall and melted into its surface, the epidermis becomes that of the blank wall hidden by the Zip. On squared frames like windows, there are black or red leathers that evoke the skin, sometimes crumpled, sometimes stretched by metal bridges which emphasize their suppleness. On a jumpsuit hung on a hanger, this is embodied in a flesh-colored latex moult on which the artist leaves the imprint of his own silhouette, pierced with silver chains drawing diamonds as on the Harlequin costume.
Fascinated by the liberating role of carnival in medieval Europe, Wertenbroek transposes taboos into her works, like intestines whose membranes are stretched and compressed in the same way as her red leather. The pretzel, one of her favorite themes, emerges in sculptures made of painted bread whose shape is at once a grimacing face, an ouroboros [a snake eating its tail] and excrement. Simultaneously attracted by the texture and preciousness of the pretzels and repelled by their inedible composition and fecal form, moved by the almost erotic excitement of the zipper and the frustration of not being able to open it, the viewer is trapped in her paradoxes. More cynical than they appear, Wertenbroek’s works bring humour to the gallery: where Anzieu penetrated patients’ psychic membranes to discover the twists and turns of their consciousness, she mischievously lifts the skin curtain of intimacy to reveal the mysteries of the self, exposing her own vulnerability with courageous temerity."
Fascinated by the liberating role of carnival in medieval Europe, Wertenbroek transposes taboos into her works, like intestines whose membranes are stretched and compressed in the same way as her red leather. The pretzel, one of her favorite themes, emerges in sculptures made of painted bread whose shape is at once a grimacing face, an ouroboros [a snake eating its tail] and excrement. Simultaneously attracted by the texture and preciousness of the pretzels and repelled by their inedible composition and fecal form, moved by the almost erotic excitement of the zipper and the frustration of not being able to open it, the viewer is trapped in her paradoxes. More cynical than they appear, Wertenbroek’s works bring humour to the gallery: where Anzieu penetrated patients’ psychic membranes to discover the twists and turns of their consciousness, she mischievously lifts the skin curtain of intimacy to reveal the mysteries of the self, exposing her own vulnerability with courageous temerity."