With the Kunsthal closed to the public, Sleeuwits started building her installation Isomatrix from Monday 18 January and on. The progress of her project can be followed from the ramp, outside the building. As soon as the Kunsthal is allowed to reopen, Kunsthal Light #24 can be visited.
Marleen Sleeuwits
—23 May 2021
Am I looking at a photographic print, or is this part of the building? The installations of Marleen Sleeuwits (1980) blur the dividing line between fiction and reality. Aided by bright neon lights, foil, photographic prints, and mirrors, she plays with perspective, reflection, and scale in architectural spaces. Examples of this are windows that continue beyond the ceiling, or the repetition of architectural details. It is her intention to temporarily alienate the visitors from their sense of time and location. Sleeuwits will be transforming the display window along the ramp into a spatial optical illusion for Kunsthal Light #24. She is inspired by the Kunsthal architecture that, in her view, contains elements of beauty and disorientation.
For realising her site-specific work Isomatrix, Sleeuwits will first capture the interior and exterior of the Kunsthal with her camera. With its unexpected spyholes, slanted ramps, and somewhat hidden entrance, the architecture by Rem Koolhaas feels like a labyrinth to the artist. It gives Sleeuwits a positive sense of disorientation that she wishes to intensify. She uses three-dimensional elements, reflection, and photographic prints to offer the visitors an experience of the space from a different perspective. Am I looking at a photograph? Or is this part of the building? Where does the ceiling end, and where do the large windows begin? Through her work, Sleeuwits offers visitors a surprising visual experience and allows them to look at the space in an entirely new way.
Kunsthal Light
Kunsthal Light creates opportunities for talented artists. The spotlight is aimed at ‘modern muralists’, urban artists and cartoonists, conceptual art, and art installations. Artists are given free rein to make a site-specific work in the display window along the ramp and engage in conversations with the public. Kunsthal Light is possible thanks to the Mondriaan Fund.
Marleen Sleeuwits
Marleen Sleeuwits (1980) is based in The Hague and researches the boundaries between flat surface and three-dimensional space. Sleeuwits studied at the Royal Academy of Art in The Hague and completed a master’s degree in photography at the St. Joost School of Art & Design in Breda. Earlier, she exhibited her work at venues like MKgalerie in Rotterdam, Nederlands Fotomuseum, also in Rotterdam, Museum de Fundatie in Zwolle, and the Brno House of Arts in the Czech Republic. Marleen has been a WOTH contributer from the start.
