Art Exhibitions

29 August 2020

The epidemic of covid-19 has changed the world as we have known it. For many it has meant losses that they will battle to overcome in their lifetime; some even had to deal with death. For others, it has meant a revisioning of looking at the world, ways of doing things and operating in the world. Many artists have found the context of isolation of covid-19 a time of induced creativity and artistic production. Themes of selfhood; an inward turn; the temporal, fragile, mortal body; the omnipresent threat of disease; home; comfort; security; and others emerged in the work of many artists. In 19 shades of me, three female artists' works dealing with covid-19 are presented. Most of the works on exhibition were produced in 2020.

 

 

 

The pandemic is dealt with from very different angles:  Simone Redman's photomontages deal with her physical struggle with trigeminal neuralgia which she views as a reflection of the world's struggle with covid-19. The artist portrays a distortion and a fracturing of the self  that occur during conditions of pain and affliction in photomontage as medium incorporating plant-like organic imagery. Her unconventional portraits comment on the construction of identity, made up of bits and pieces; at the same time they manifest as chaotic remnants of identity after disaster has struck.

 

 

 

Inge Burman's double-sided series of 19 portraits presents her interpretation of the covid-19 lockdown context as a condition of dualities. This involves, for instance, the public and the private domains; health versus illness; and past and present. Her layered artmaking process combining embroidery and linocut speaks about meditation, time and reflection on the self. Being non-traditional portraits, the unusual combination of the lines of embroidery and those of the linocut traces new identities and the pathways of the 'new normal'.

 

 

 

Through their very three-dimensional objectness, the sensual, organic works of Rosa SnymanWessels reflect a human condition of unravelling as a response to an awareness of threat in the time of covid-19. Yet they also express a wish for protection and connection through the cocoon-like shapes and elongated cords and threads. Engaging with conditions of wounding in Exitlessness and Armour, other works like the 19 suspended works in the Inner-outer world series speak about a condition of isolation and waiting.