Simone Distler - Gian Merlevede
Wrestling in the Sea
+
Interspaces
About the exhibition
Simone Distler (31)
Zum Bearbeiten hier klicken .Interspaces / „Zwischen-Räume“ - Simone Distler (2013 Silkscreen sequence 1 - 10, framed) |
The Silkscreen sequence Interspaces / "Zwischen-Räume" (2012-2013) is about our journeying through life. I wanted to take hold of some single moments. Of stages on a travelling path. Segments and developments that stand on its own, yet partake in a bigger movement. In my art, wandering through a visual landscape often symbolizes passages and journeys of the human soul, including all formative years. It's often about exchanging processes and organic flow. For instance, mountains can become huge obstacles on someone's footpath. Blocking off any passage (emotionally and/or literally). While some obstacles force one to rise up to the challenge. Quite fascinating how some roads/graphic lines continually keep winding into the unknown. Paths/graphs often unfold quite unexpectedly, thwarting any expectation. You never know which stage of the passage leads you right through, or which bypass is popping up, leading you around the problem altogether. Some bundles of lines in black ink may block your eye, but then again you can follow the white spaces of the paper like a way out: spacial transits and breakthroughs! This way the wandering gaze may pull up alongside with something of the soul's flow through the picture. → Overview Series |
Gian Michael Merlevede (40)
About the Sequence
The series Wrestling in the Sea with the One (2007-2013) isn't finished yet. As we speak, I'm working on some more paintings. Back in 2007 I showed my first exhibition Wrestling in the Sea with the One! All the paintings focused on the theme of man struggling with self, and wrestling with the sovereign Creator. The central visual metaphor of choice in that exhibition summarized: Caught between cliff and sea breakers. In the same time I started working on another visual metaphor to capture this same subject of existential-religious struggle: The theme of the "darkened" throne hall of the Creator. My paintings often reflect aspects of my journey of faith. I belong to the earth, as much as I belong to the unseen, the heavenly. For now, I live in the unyielding rift between those two worlds. That is what I contemplate. The biblical informations increase my awareness of God's sovereign ways of redemption. We humans often gain clarity only in the aftermath of inner struggles. |
Copyright: Merlevede-Distler 2014