"Navigating the Gaze: A Reading of Rivers Without Return" by Eliza Cabot
“Rivières Sans Retour”, Bernard de Wolf
Exposition individuelle du 16 septembre au 10 octobre 2026
For the 2026 Season, Vanities Gallery is pleased to welcome Eliza Cabot as Junior Expert.
A native of Boston, Miss Cabot is reading for a Bachelor of Arts in Art History at Bucknell University, where she has been distinguished with Dean's List honours. She further serves as Executive Member of the Trevisani Fund for Art Acquisition, responsible for the acquisition of works on behalf of the University collection.
Her formation bridges scholarship and practice: Art Communications and Digital Marketing at the Sotheby's Institute of Art, and Business and AI Marketing at the London School of Economics. She has gained hands-on experience in the art market in Boston, as Auction & Gallery Assistant at Bonhams Skinner and Grogan & Company, two of the city's most respected auction houses.
Presently based in Paris as part of her IES Abroad programme in Art History and French, Miss Cabot supports the gallery in artwork research, exhibition installation, and the development of our communications strategy.
Possessed of a keen eye for visual analysis and a assured command of art history from the Renaissance to Post-Modernism, she emerges as a compelling new voice. We are delighted to present her text on Rivières Sans Retour by Bernard de Wolf.
The evening of Wednesday, September 16th, was extraordinary. I, alongside Monsieur Thierry Tessier and a cohort of artists and art aficionados, filled the halls of the Vanities Gallery with engagement, conversation, and intellectual exchange.
Bernard de Wolf is an Amsterdam native, scholar, and current distinguished artist who specializes in the philosophy of cultures, aesthetics, and a plethora of other interdisciplinary humanities. He exhibited a collection of works inspired by the constant movement and uncontrollable nature of flowing water and its current, while also exploring the ever-changing yet enduring ambiguity of something that can’t remain still.
Walking through the gallery, I observed the ebbs and flows of each canvas. Surfaces changed with the surrounding light, proximity to the canvas, and variations in the thickness and texture of De Wolf’s oil paint.
Two canvases in particular caught my attention. They both evoke the natural world, but their use of different colors allows for a different experience and perception of the moment.
Canvas (A) is a hot, intense fury with no clear visuals of water, but it exudes a flow as the eyes dart across the landscape. This flow is easier still to capture in canvas (B), an airy, blue, tranquil landscape with clearly visible water. It, too, begs the viewer to move the focus across the surface. Each canvas, though different in color schemes and specific elements, offers the viewer a similar overarching emotion. Both emphasize nature's movement and the different aspects of beauty we can find and appreciate.
Traversing through this constantly moving current, we are the pilots who dictate our destinations. Each of De Wolf’s canvases invites the viewer into its own voyage. As viewers, we choose how we let these different currents move us. Will we observe beauty in every pool of water? Or must we create this beauty by stepping further in?
Perhaps there is no answer. Beauty rests not on one definition; it is as unique as moving water. I find depth in that.
Eliza Cabot
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