First Things First
dal 1/11/2006 al 18/11/2006
Segnalato da
1/11/2006
First Things First
CCNOA Center for Contemporary Non-Objective Art, Bruxelles
Elizabeth Haines, Clemens Hollerer, Barbora Klimova, and Leon Vranken. The exhibition features the work of four young artists, who are all attending the postgraduate course at the HISK. The formal language of minimalism and post-minimalism remains to the present day an inexhaustible source of inspiration for them.
Elizabeth Haines, Clemens Hollerer, Barbora Klimova, and Leon Vranken
The Center for Contemporary Non-Objective Art (CCNOA) in cooperation
with the Higher Institute for Fine Arts (HISK), Antwerp, is pleased to
present the exhibition ‘First Things First’ featuring the work of four
young artists, namely Elizabeth Haines, Clemens Hollerer, Barbora
Klimova, and Leon Vranken, who are all attending the postgraduate
course at the HISK.
The formal language of minimalism and post-minimalism remains to the
present day an inexhaustible source of inspiration for young artists.
Yet one can wonder - ironically or even cynically - how often a white
monochrome canvas can be painted and exhibited, how many variations one
can think up of a white cube, an empty pedestal, or a colored wall.
But this is exactly what is amazing about the work of the generation of
artists brought together in the First Things First exhibition at CCNOA.
The variations on the familiar themes and motifs from a recent chapter
of modernism are infinite. By strategies of shifts, reflections, minor
re-orientations, the repetition of repetition, and the serialization of
serialization, minimalist vocabulary can still be expanded and
enriched. Though that said, this enrichment is also ambiguous because
of the sins committed against some of the pure concepts of minimalism.
The works of the forefathers are not canonized, but rather seen as
examples that can even be treated with disrespect. Dialects and
contaminations occur. Also striking - and I don't know whether this has
to do with the DIY mentality of young cash-strappedd artists - is a
certain form of artisanship. The manual execution of the work is
certainly not irrelevant in the case of Clemens Hollerer or Leon
Vranken.
Clemens Hollerer ('1975, Austria) sees himself as a 'pupil' of Blinky
Palermo. A number of his works can be interpreted as distinct homages
to the too early departed German artist. For the CCNOA show Hollerer,
as he often does, starts with the given architectural space. Either a
wall (as surface) or a skylight (as a composition grid) becomes part of
his two- and three-dimensional spatial interventions. The fact that his
objects are hand-painted adds to the pictorial vibration of the work.
An interesting tension originates between the suspicion of industrial
perfection and the confrontation with what is in the end a very humane
and poetic execution.
The objects of Leon Vranken ('1975, Belgium) were also built or rather
put together by the artist. The work he made for First Things First is
even partly recycled. For the wooden structure of the display cabinet
he used the frame and legs of an old pool table. In the cabinets
Vranken brings together two preoccupations. On the one hand he plays
with the meaning of the cabinet object as a display cabinet in which
the artwork (or valuable object) is both presented and intensified
(because of the segregation). On the other hand he deconstructs the
cabinets in such a way that they become sculptures in their own right.
The work of Elizabeth Haines ('1980, United Kingdom) always generates a
special relationship with the spectator and often plays with notions of
presence and absence. Each artwork has to be mentally completed to be
fully understood. The processing of the information provided to the
spectator in a fragmented, sequential or slowed-down way is one of the
undercurrents of her work. This issue, related to minimalism, is shaped
in various media, from sculptures or large installations to video
works. For CCNOA Elizabeth Haines is preparing a video work in which
the image of a flying falcon is center stage. The image is spread over
several monitors, complicating the experience of time and space.
Barbora Klimova (' 1977, Czech Republic) intervenes in both urban
public spaces, and public and private interiors. Even though the formal
intervention is what is noticed first, her work has much more to do
with the relationship between and the behavior of people in a specific
space and with the historical or social context. The minimalist imagery
of both the art of the sixties and seventies and the reinterpretation
of this idiom in recent art, design, and architecture come together in
new approaches and redefinitions of spaces and objects. For the CCNOA
show Barbora Klimova charts new paths by using video recordings of
performances by Czech artists of the seventies and showing them in
different spatial and socio-economic contexts. The (difference in)
behaviour of the viewing public is what interests her most.
There are always more reasons for not bringing together specific
artists in an exhibition than vice versa. Despite these reasons, the
combination of these four artists is more than legitimate. The fact
that they are all attending the postgraduate course at the Higher
Institute for Fine Arts (HISK) in Antwerp could be seen as an arbitrary
criterion. Being born between 1975 and 1980 would be a bit less so. But
the way they react to the inheritance of art from the sixties and
seventies, more particularly minimal art, definitely is not. And the
many strategies at hand to tackle these issues make this generation of
artists intriguing. (Hans Martens, Artistic Director, HISK Antwerp)
Opening: 2 November 2006
CCNOA
center for contemporary non-objective art vzw
Blvd Barthelemylaan 5 - Brussels