Birde Vanheerswynghels and Aiden Morse at Tatjana Pieters

Artists: Birde Vanheerswynghels, Aiden Morse

Exhibition title: The Cat With Nine Lives, Ghost To Ghost

Venue: Tatjana Pieters, Ghent, Belgium

Date: June 22 – July 20, 2016

Photography: all images copyright and courtesy of the artists and Tatjana Pieters

We are honoured to present the first 2 solo exhibitions by Belgian artist Birde Vanheerswynghels and Australian artist Aiden Morse. Working in different mediums they share an interest in creating artificial worlds. What seems to be an observation of reality is actually a composed image from personal impressions.

Vanheerswynghels is known for her impressive large scale charcoal drawings of constructed and lush landscapes that stem from a mental archive of images. ‘The
cat with nine lives’ refers to Vanheerswynghels’ first insight into how 3-dimensionality can be experienced as 2-dimensionality. As a child she saw a cat getting driven over by a car and got fascinated by the shape the animal transformed into. In her working process she recreates this transit from figuration to abstraction and back again by starting from photographs, mainly self made polaroids. As the foundation for her drawings, these polaroids act as fragments of a composition that becomes a new image. In the exhibition a series of these polaroids is presented, underlining the autonomous force of her photographic work.

Considering the process of drawing as an analysis of certain shapes, Vanheerswynghels often re-uses the same subjects, like trees, bushes, flowers, ponds, plants and birds. In her new series of drawings we see an enhanced adaption of techniques, creating a variety of patterns and contrasts. By using a combination of coloured pastel, charcoal and highlights made by erasing parts of the drawing, the work becomes rich of depth in which black is not just black. Rendering her subjects enlarged and overly dimensional, the photographic space of the images becomes alienated and the spectator is tricked. The experience of what we see becomes physical. The presence of colour in the charcoal drawings finds its research in a series of large scale pigment prints. A blow-up of a polaroid is covered with layers of pigment creating an object that is in between drawing and photography. As with her charcoal drawings the viewer doesn’t immediately know what he is looking at. The image manifest itself slowly, creating the feeling of a lost or artificial memory.

At first glance, the work of Vanheerswynghels seems to be traditional. But nothing could be further from the truth. Vanheerswynghels does not draw, she dances and sings. The dance together with a sense of liberty form the basis of her drawings. The artist dances in her continuous quest for artistic evolution and development.

Birde Vanheerswynghels (1986, BE) lives & works in Ghent. In 2015 she was the winner of the Baker Tilly Roelfs Prize, Düsseldorf (DE) for her work in the group
show ‘Terra Incognita’, KIT, Düsseldorf (DE). She made several residencies in Cité Internationale des Arts, Paris (GR), Kunstprojektraum Tapir, Berlin (DE), Boiling Point PRESS Berlin (DE) and Takt kunstprojektraum, Berlin (DE). She had group exhibitions in amongst others Drawing Center Diepenheim, Diepenhein (NL), Croxhapox, Ghent (BE), Galerie Martin Kudlek, Köln (DE), Voorkamer, Lier (BE).

The title ‘Ghost to Ghost’ by Aiden Morse is inspired by the Australian paranormal/conspiracy radio show Coast to Coast. It immediately sets the tone for the show. Mysterious and creepy, the basis of the works lies in a weeklong stay in a cabin in the woods together with his girlfriend Anna. The photographs stem from an interest in documentary photography, specifically in that of ufo activity. Morse also refers to this interest in the titles of the works, all inspired by reports of extra-terrestrial activity.

The photoshop-polished aesthetic of these works distances them from the photographic vernacular. Instead of representations of the real, Morse’s photographs are a tribute to the slippery and seductive power of images. The images are often linked to concepts as the uncanny and lifelessness. They are autobiographical, although at the same time they are clearly constructed. Clues referring to the social environment of the artist can be noticed, but they appear enlarged and alienated. He aims to make the familiar unfamiliar.

Aiden Morse (1994, AU) lives & works in Melbourne (AU). He had solo exhibitions at Fort Delta, Melbourne (AU), HOUSE Gallery, Georgia (US) and Barkly Place, Melbourne (AU). He also participated in several group exhibitions and online projects, amongst others Fort Delta, Melbourne (AU), Tatjana Pieters, Ghent (BE), STCFTHOTS, Leeds (UK), Peninsula Art Space, Brooklyn (US), ARI, Tasmania (AU), Signal Screens, Melbourne (AU), Udstillingsstedet Q, Copenhagen and Krabbesholm (DK), QUAD Projects, Melbourne (AU), Melbourne Central, Melbourne (AU), RMIT Gallery, Melbourne (AU), Little Woods Gallery, Melbourne (AU), New Low, Melbourne (AU), Federation Square Big Screen, Melbourne (AU), Mutuo Centro de Arte, Barcelona (ES), Carriage works, Sydney (AU), The Royal Standard, Liverpool (UK), Parallelograms, online and Photoville, Brooklyn (US).