GLASS REVERIE
Paris, March 2026
Lying in a bed inside an aquarium with peaceful music blasting in my ears, the world around me is slightly distorted as fish go by. There’s an uncanny sense of calm. “That’s what I wanted people to feel; it’s supposed to be the ultimate relaxing experience.” That’s what ARIANA PAPADEMETROPOULOS tells me right after I leave her installation piece, Water Based Treatment, the crowning jewel in her solo exhibit in Paris, Glass Slipper. I meet the Los Angeles-based artist inside the gallery Thaddaeus Ropac in the heart of the Marais. It’s a beautiful morning, and the sun is shining through the windows of the monumental room Glass Slipper is in, framed as an altar in a surreal church. Large-scale paintings devoid of human presence are hung high. “I wanted it to feel like a religious space.”
Papademetropoulos walks me through the exhibit, carefully explaining the telephone booths where recordings of her conversation with a psychic can be heard and the multiple still life paintings of a microwave. It’s a rare act for an artist, one that invites interpretation. “It’s silly to think artists are meant to describe everything.” It’s understandable; her work is deeply personal. Building on Jungian psychological archetypes and a mythological femininity, the artist explores parallel realms to our own. Glass Slipper, for example, documents the struggle to “find magic” during a hard time. Thankfully, here, Papademetropoulos lets us join in on the journey to discuss artistic freedom, astral travelling, and an artist’s right not to explain their art.
Artwork: Snow White and No Dwarves, 2026, oil on canvas
What was your first memory of art?
I remember going to Robert Therrien's shows when I was five, full Alice in Wonderland.
Did it feel like a world you wanted to participate in?
I honestly don't remember. I think art has just always been with me. I’ve always created. I remember copying a George Grosz marching figure that had one foot up when I was probably five.
Left Exhibition views at Thaddaeus Ropac gallery, Water Based Treatment, 2026, Fish tank, mattress and headphones
Right Jupiter and Io, 2026, oil on canvas
You work across different mediums. Do you feel like they speak to different sides of you or does all your creativity have the same source?
I’ve always painted, but it's not because I’m necessarily a painter, it's just what I could afford to do. I think that the paintings got larger and larger because I’ve always wanted to go into installation, but I just didn’t have the resources. Their size was a way for me to immerse people in them. I didn’t have the resources for, for example, making an aquarium or a telephone booth as I’ve done for this show.
Would you then call yourself an artist over a painter?
I like saying I'm a painter, because I think it's less pretentious. it’s nice to have a skill attached to what you do. It's humbler. But I think, as time goes on, I'll probably expand more into installations and video work.
You bring up an interesting point: the mediums you are exploring require more production and, with it, a loss of control, in a way. Is that something that concerns you?
I'm so psycho that I don’t think it does. I need to be involved in every step of the process. Even the films I’ve made, I’m the one editing.
Left The Mistress, 2026, oil on canvas
Right The Wife, 2026, oil on canvas
Speaking of films, the one you shot for the Louvre was incredible. It reflects on a dream, a theme that is transversal to your work. What fascinates you about dreaming?
I'm very interested in Carl Jung and what's called astral traveling. I'm fascinated by all these extensions of reality and the quantum world. All these things are just reflections of what's in our present life. It feels to me as if they’re actually the same. I don’t think of these things as being dreams, they’re reality. I just got back from Iceland, which has a younger landscape than the rest of the world: it’s a couple of million years old instead of a couple of billion years old. Because of that, it feels like you’re on an alien planet. That's how I think of all of this. My work isn’t surreal, it’s just a little to the left. The microwave paintings I just showed you are actually just paintings. These aren’t dreams, it's just having a different perspective on this reality, seeing it under a little different light.
In this exhibit, you have references to Freud as well as conversations with a psychic, how do you intersect the two?
What is most interesting to me is the collision of magic and science. That’s what I’m always investigating with my work. The psychic realm and the quantum realm. I like seeing the unseen world made visible.
Left Exhibition views at Thaddaeus Ropac gallery
Right spooky action at a distance, 2026, oil on canvas
Is that the jugular of this exhibit?
This show was inspired by me being stuck in LA. It was the longest time I spent in the city. Elements like the spa, the microwave, the dry cleaning: I was on the precipice of a nervous breakdown. There was less fantasy than usual, so I had to find it elsewhere. I think I have 10 shows just within this one. I like building them as if they’re journeys.
Do you think about the destination when you’re creating?
For this show I actually made a maquette in real life of how I wanted everything to look in the space but then I got here, and everything changed. There’s something about the physical space, even something like that can affect the trajectory.
Are you open to the idea of change?
I think you have to be. There are some elements that I understand immediately, in this exhibit that would be the dark room before you enter the altar where the aquarium is. But everything's in flow between control and surrender, and then finding that flow between it. You have to let things happen the way they happen.
The Afters, 2026, oil on canvas
Do you feel the same way about having people interpret your work? Do you ever feel the need to explain the intention behind your art?
No at all. I prefer when people interpret. That’s what keeps art alive. When you don’t fully understand it then you can ruminate. Why do people like the Mona Lisa so much? Because we don’t understand her expression. Why do we love David Lynch? Because we can’t figure out the endings. I think our culture is so interested in having a big bow tied on it to understand something, but I actually think that kind of kills it. It’s silly to think artists are meant to describe everything. I make images. That's what I'm good at, creating images, creating feelings, creating visceral reactions. I’m open to how they can spark ideas because I’m also just beginning to understand it.
Exhibition views at Thaddaeus Ropac gallery
Is creating therapeutic?
Totally. I think this show reflects a really hard year of my life. I was trying to feel better. Talking to psychics, going to the spa, trying to present myself: there’s this desire for transformation, this need to find a glimmer of magic in the ordinary.
Your work has an appeal that extends beyond the confines of a gallery. I knew your exhibit was in town because I saw the aquarium on social media. How do you feel about that online attention?
The art world can be tricky about it. Art can sometimes be made for the elite. I would rather make things for people. If it brings joy to someone like the ordinary person who wouldn't go to a gallery, I think that's nice. And if it gets to reach more people, I think that's okay. It feels more generous. Just like when I was a kid and saw art for the first time, it’s nice to think I’m exposing someone to this world in a similar way.
The exhibition Glass Slipper by Ariana Papademetropoulos is on view at Thaddaeus Ropac in Paris from March 7th to April 11th, 2026
Interview by Pedro Vasconcelos
All pictures © Ariana Papademetropoulos, Courtesy Thaddaeus Ropac gallery, London · Paris · Salzburg · Milan · Seoul, Photos: Nicolas Brasseur