For an anacrusis ten years may be a bit long but LhGWR has probably found itself cocooned in its gallery and wants to fly out now like a butterfly.
Of course that should be respected, but on the other hand it is a bit sad to see a good platform for photography go, as this is LhGWR’s last exhibition in its gallery.
It is sad because LhGWR like no other place in The Hague, and like just maybe a few other places in the country, has shown its audience what style is in contemporary photography.
Style in photography is not stylishness or an aesthetic hype; it is a way of finding balance in a chaotic world, basically by means of looking through a lens.
Photography, as such, is a reflective medium par excellence, both technically and philosophically.
In this last bow LhGWR shows works by ten of its artists with whom they have intensively co-operated through the years.
The exhibition lets the works speak for themselves without bothering much about names and titles (so i stick to that same principle in this case), but to regular visitors they will be recognisable or even familiar.
In the mean time i hope to see and hear more of future initiatives by LhGWR, maybe even in this village of pomp and rubbish.
According to the exhibition text the cardinal question is “How can we analyze mechanisms of power and abuse both from the past and the present, towards the future?”
Theatre of Wrong DecisionsTheatre of Wrong Decisions
As usual the way to find an answer is more interesting than the answer itself.
Chung Kyung-miChung Kyung-mi
It results in an interesting exhibition with works varying from very expressive to very hermetic.
Chung Kyung-miShim Jung-ah
The works by the Koreans reflect, as far as it is manifest, on the victim role of Korean women during the Japanese occupation and the Korean War.
Shim Jung-ahShim Jung-ah
With such a heavy and still open historic trauma it is probably difficult not to reflect on.
Shim Jung-ahKim Su-hyang
As such the danger is that too little attention is given to the present position of women in war, or even at war, and to a diversion from the victimhood that is too narrow a focus to assess the role of women (or others) in war.
Kim Su-hyangKim Su-hyang
Most works are interesting, but some need more explanation.
Kim Su-hyangMin Cheol-hong
For instance, the untitled video work by Min Cheol-hong looks quite wonderful but what is the connection with the issue?
Min Cheol-hongHan Soong-hoon
Even one of the most beautiful works in the show, Bouquet of Memories by Kim Su-hyang, surely has more to say than just itself.
Two years ago Anne Forest (1983) had an exhibition in Heden about which i wrote that her work had “matured considerably,” that her style was “immediately recognisable” but “also manoeuvrable.”
Well, in her present show at Heden one could say she is still manoeuvring at different levels.
In two paintings she seems to make more of a perspective space around her figures and there she enters uncertain terrain that seems to be alien to her icon-like style.
Are these the margins of her style?
That is all the more important as her best works create a space of their own around them by themselves.
The Russian-born French sculptor Ossip Zadkine (1888/90-1967) has a special relationship with the Netherlands, in particular with Rotterdam, where his monument The Destroyed City, placed in 1953, became the ultimate modernist war monument (click here to see some pictures of the monument in situ).
Zadkine is clearly the proverbial artist of the second quarter of the 20th century with a lot of expressionism and cubism and a touch of Modigliani in his portraits.
192919361923
As such he was an inventive craftsman and a prolific artist, and there is a lot to be admired in the show.
193019241939
However, his prolific output also makes his work a bit predictable which becomes clear in this exhibition of one hundred works (!), crammed into this otherwise very spacious museum.
193719371935
The presentation is more or less chronological in a kind of makeshift galleries and more loosely arranged in the left over open space, an approach that tries to bring some order in this forest of sculptures.
194319431948
As such the presentation lacks good sightlines which might have expressed the special qualities of certain works in dialogue with each other.
195119511951
What lyrical power the individual works may have, is destroyed by this massive, wholesale approach.
192919291956
However, for the aficionados who just want to see a lot of Zadkine this is probably their best chance.
Here are some impressions of the show (as far as the dark season allowed me to produce them).
As i have written quite extensively about the exhibition in VLR, i leave you here with these pictures, but of course it is better to go there and take a look yourself.
Probably the best word to describe the works of the present exhibition at Maurits van de Laar’s Gallery is ‘awkward,’ but in a very positive way.
Marjolijn van der MeijMarjolijn van der MeijMarjolijn van der MeijMarjolijn van der MeijShary BoyleShary Boyle
One could also define it as radical theatricality; the crumpling of her subjects by Marjolijn van der Meij (1970), the exaggeration of her scenes by Shary Boyle (1972), the intensifying of the interaction between her actors by Susanna Inglada (1983) and the firm anachronising of the present day and the First World War by Cedric ter Bals (1990).
In the front gallery especially Van der Meij steals the show with her crumpled Arcadian kitsch presented on shiny silk, extremely over-the-top in a way that it becomes extremely down-to-earth again.
Susanna IngladaCedric ter BalsCedric ter BalsCedric ter BalsCedric ter BalsCedric ter Bals
In the lower part of the gallery Ter Bals makes a colourful carnival of death, destruction and reincarnation.
Office building Casuariestraat corner Bleijenburg.
Built during the first half of the 1970s, it is a typical example of modernist property development architecture.
It is anonymous and simple in its concept, not designed for a certain public function, but as a skeleton to earn money with.
In spite of that there is a quaint kind of elegance in the façade with its regular relief-like vertical ribs.
It’s a pity the surface of the concrete has got a tan; originally whitish grey, now it is like essentialist modernity’s old age (also with the somehow very postmodern quasi-old fashioned lanterns, placed more recently on the pavement).
However, in Billytown’s new gallery space they seem to be the perfect trio to open a potentially challenging program of exhibitions.
Laura JatkowskiLaura JatkowskiLaura JatkowskiLaura Jatkowski
The emphasis of the show is characteristically on the merging of making and thinking and its spatial consequences.
Left to right: Manor Grunewald, Laura Jatkowski, Ricardo van EykRicardo van EykRicardo van EykRicardo van Eyk
All three artists focus both on the overall impression of their works as well as on the details.
Ricardo van EykRicardo van EykRicardo van Eyk
Conceptual thinking is mixed with the possibilities of the used materials, in Jatkowski’s case even acoustics and video.
Laura JatkowskiFront: Laura Jatkowski; back: Manor GrunewaldLeft to righ, Ricardo van Eyk, Laura JatkowskiFront: Laura Jatkowski; back: Ricardo van Eyk
The day i visited to make these photos the autumn weather was grey and gloomy, which made it next to impossible to make some clear pictures in spite of the building’s big windows.
Front: Laura Jatkowski; back: Ricardo van EykRicardo van EykRicardo van EykLeft to right: Manor Grunewald, Ricardo van Eyk, Laura Jatkowski
On the other hand, it gave the works and the space a more monumental and concise character.
Left to right: Ricardo van Eyk, Manor GrunewaldLaura JatkowskiLaura JatkowskiLaura Jatkowski
On the whole it is a very promising first show in a new chapter of Billytown’s existence.
Villa Next Door 2 