Abstraction forms a guiding principle in the practices of the ten artists brought together in To the Edge. Abstract art is often spurred by a desire to blur or abolish boundaries: those between work and context, art and life, and, ultimately, between physical and mental space. The very idea of the boundary or edge itself; both as a concept and as a material phenomenon, has thus become one of abstraction’s prime themes.
While abstraction is traditionally associated with painting, it emerges in many forms, as this exhibition demonstrates. It often serves as a motivation to reconsider, expand, or hack the rules and expectations governing established media. Selina Trepp’s video demonstrates how stop-motion animation extends her practice of pictorial improvisation into time. The sculptures of Leyla Aydoslu and Charlotte Giacobbi also express an effort to break free from the physical limitations of painting. Abstract figures in diverse materials are literally lifted out of the canvas or panel and introduced into physical space. Ines Thora makes the reverse move: by inscribing atypical supports and techniques into the canvas, she broadens our understanding of painting from within.
The paintings of Dilum Coppens and Jan Willem van Welzenis do not primarily address matter but reach toward the mind. While Coppens, through intuitive collages and expressive color, taps into an indeterminate amalgam of myths and primal tales, Van Welzenis with a gestural touch seeks to directly appeal to our emotions. In this way, he reconnects with the legacy Abstract Expressionism, which flourished in the 1950s. The pathos of that movement soon gave way to the cool, distilled forms and colors of Minimalism, whose echoes are perceivable in the work of Kirstin Arndt, Riki Mijling, Don Voisine, and Ronald Zuurmond. What unites their sculptures and paintings is an attention to the clean line, geometric planes and volumes, and the monochrome.
Within the space of K.L.8, this so-called “hard edge” approach contrasts with more organically oriented forms of abstraction. In this way, To the Edge not only showcases a sampling of abstraction, but also demonstrates the continued vitality of this tradition.
