Silke Otto-Knapp works with watercolour and gouache paints on canvas, building up and breaking down the painted surface to create works of subtle effect.

Her paintings and drawings explore the interplay of rural and urban aesthetics while illuminating her characters' quotidian experience. Inspired by theater sets and botanical gardens, these dreamlike compositions are populated by ghostly figures, shadows, and open-aired amphitheaters.

This catalogue surveys Otto-Knapp's paintings from the past five years, in which staged figures and landscapes are at the centre of her explorations into the construction of pictorial space.

Published on the occasion of the exhibitions (July – September 2009) Present time exercise at the Museum of Modern Art Oxford, and Standing anywhere in the space in a relaxed position at the Banff Centre, Alberta, Canada.