ALBERT MERTZ AND LONE MERTZ
STALKE GALLERI KIRKE SONNERUP
October 1th. to November 3th.
Stalke Galleri, Kirke Sonnerup has invited Lone Mertz to curate a show which takes as its starting point the cooperation she had with Albert Mertz from 1974 until his death in 1990.
The show will include both known and unknown works, old and quite new, together forming a coherent installation.
Throughout his life Albert Mertz used many different artistic expressions, methods and media, but – as he often said - ”the difference is the same”! It was not about a certain style or form, but about the most precise way of showing content and meaning, which again and again was exposed to new investigations and new questions.
Albert Mertz was for many years occupied with the philosophy of the east, which also links up with his investigations around the colours red and blue, which interesting enough are also part of the Tibetan conceptual world.
It was this track Lone Mertz was to follow. The glass coffin she made on Glænø Beach in Denmark in 1993 was later installed, in a different form, in the Himalayas at 4.400 meters above sea level. It still exists in the mountains as the glass in four windows in a tibetan temple, a fact which throws a symbolic light in the direction of Albert Mertz´first presentation of red and blue.
This presentation, in 1972 at Den Frie in Copenhagen, was accompanied by the work ”Painted Windows”, 7 photos printed on canvas and mounted on stretchers as paintings. The photos, taken by Albert Mertz' daughter, the photographer Susanne Mertz, showed some painted, false, illusory windows which one could not see through, and told about an art which no longer had the necessary transparency or relation to use for ordinary life, an art which blindly closed in on itself and its own conventions.
Art in the showroom or the gallery is a closed affair, often with a single-minded aim; but the red-blue proposition might still show us a way out of this sanctuary towards the life's diversity, where creative ability is the most important blueprint for human beings.
Lone Mertz has throughout the years been involved in many shows with Albert Mertz. The latest in 2010 in Kunsthalle Lingen in Germany, where he was represented by some important works and two big reconstructions of painted walls. On the 6th. October 2011 Daimler Contemporary in Berlin opens ”Conceptual Tendencies 1960s to today” with, amongst others, 25 works of Albert Mertz, who with this exhibition has found a place in the history of art outside of Denmark.
This comes about now, just as the long awaited book with his comprehensive notes ”Mertz om Mertz” is about to be published by the Danish publishing house,Vandkunsten.
We look forward to welcoming you at the opening Saturday 1th. October from 13-17.
Stalke Galleri
Englerupvej 62
4060 Kirke Saaby
Denmark
e.mail: Stalke@stalke.dk
www.stalke.dk
First opening Copenhagen
Project by STALKE OUT OF SPACE
Stalke Out of Space has the great pleasure of announcing the first exhibition ”On view #1" in corporation with FLINK. New project space in Copenhagen
The new space function as show- and project space for Stalke Out Of Space, and a new supplement to the other activities of Stalke Gallery.
Stalke Out Of Space aims at 3-4 yearly exhibitions and now great to add to the main program of the gallery.
On the first opening Stalke Out Of Space will show a selection of artist:
Thorgej Steen Hansen
Jeannette Ehlers
William Anthony
William Anastasi
Dove Bradshaw
Nikolaj Recke
Bella Angora
Søren Dahlgaard
….
me perceive place
Performance video by Bella Angora
The performance project „me perceive place“ by Bella Angora was developed for the Vienna Fair 2011 and focused on psychological and physical options and attempts in order to place yourself within the fields of different social systems. Bella Angora was taking place on the lap of the approximately 200 art fair visitors within the frame of one-to-one-performances in order to start an exchange regarding this complex of themes by using different levels of perception.
Always one person could enter the performance box that was placed in a booth of the art fair to perceive a 1:1 experience with the artist on several perception levels. The visual perception channel was fed by a music video. The soundtrack to the video had served the additive perception that one could hear over a headphone. At the same time Bella Angora was sitting on the lap of the viewer, singing the vocals live and directly into the second ear of each person. By doing so she was triggering the physical perception channel. The space in the box was tiny, the closeness huge.....
The visitors of the art fair had the opportunity to step out of the art market situation for a brief moment into a quite enraptured and unreal ambient. The here presented video shows a selection of the performances.
The Vienna based artist Bella Angora is collaborating with Gallery Stalke since many years and performed/exhibited at different places in Copenhagen like Overgaden, Gallery Dunk!, Copenhagen Alternative Art fair, Art Copenhagen or Gallery North.
In relation to „me perceive place“ Bella Angora will present the performance „Darkroom“ on the 15th of September 2011 at Kunsthallen Nikolaj. This project is working with similar mechanisms like „me perceive place“ but furthermore is treating another sub theme. With „Darkroom“ the artist wants to break expectations that we are having due to certain conditionings as well as sharpen our senses by building a special room installation.
The term „Darkroom“ relates to more or less escalating sexual practices – in this special „Darkroom“ the kind of touch is different: sitting on a lap (like a child) and the touch of the breath that is reaching the ear when Angora is singing....Both two very „innocent“ actions that also implicate a kind of sexual attraction as well. These totally soft, sensitive and reduced actions want to communicate the need to perceive informations on a more subtile and differentiated level that is standing in opposite to our mostly very loud and aggressive surrounding that often comes with an overdose of sensual penetration.
The room installation will allow the audience to watch this very intimate situation from outside by viewing through optical lenses that are embedded in the walls of the room. This will give the whole situation a strong voyeuristic touch and by entering the „Darkroom“ the viewer is changing roles from „observer“ to „observed object“ within two steps.....
We look forward to welcoming you to the opening on Friday September 9th. From 5 to 8 pm
Place:
Flink. /Stalke Out Of Space
Nørre Alle 1
2200 Copenhagen N
Denmark
Mette Flink & Sam Jedig
The exhibitions ends on November 11th 2011
Open by oppointment:
Contact:
Flink.
Nørre Alle 1
2200 Copenhagen N
Denmark
Att: Mette Flink
e-mail: mette@flink-art.dk
+45 40319223
And
Stalke Galleri/ Stalke Out Of Space
Englerupvej 62
4060 Kirke Saaby
Denmark
Phone: +45 29267433
www.stalke.dk
e-mail stalke@stalke.dk
