Stroom asked artists in The Hague which more or less recent exhibition or work of art they would like to see under the present circumstances and why. The present exhibition shows proposals by Annechien Meier, Janice McNab, Richard Sluijs and Jorrit Paaijmans.
McNab shows paintings by herself. She made them twenty years ago as a project called Multiple Chemical Sensitivity – The Isolation Paintings.
These paintings deal with people who are extremely allergic to chemicals, and who have to live a life in isolation. Indeed these are moving works under the present crisis, although isolation doesn’t seem to be much of an issue anymore.
Which goes to show that even a crisis itself is an historic construction with different phases of intensity and remembrance.
Designer Richard Sluijs proposed to show again his book about suicides during the Banking crisis Complete Lexicon of Crisis Related Suicides – 2008-2013 / Volume 1.
Leafing through the book may give you the idea of walking in a very sad graveyard, almost a war cemetery.
Jorrit Paaijmans suggested SHRINK 01995 a performance piece by Lawrence Malstaf in which a person (in this case the artist himself) is vacuum-drawn in between two plastic sheets.
Watching man, helpless in his own protective isolation, indeed gives an extreme idea of the oppressiveness of the human condition.
Annechien Meier suggested a painting by Marjolein van Haasteren: The Storm. The work reminded Meier of the present situation the world is in.
Due to the refurbishment of the gallery (a great improvement indeed) which allows more light and sensitivity, the works in the exhibition are even given a sense of isolation.
Sluijs suggested to give his book a place near Stroom’s entrance but has now been given its own place, its own chapel so to say, in Stroom’s main gallery.
As for my own private suggestions for works that are revalued by the present crisis, i refer you to four articles (in Dutch) in Villa La Repubblica: click here, here, here and here .
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© Villa Next Door 2020
Contents of all photographs courtesy to the artists, the owners of the works and to Stroom, Den Haag.
Bertus Pieters
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