"Job Koelewijn: Try and See it Your Way"
2003-02-08 until 2003-05-04
Henry Moore Institute
Leeds, , UK

This solo exhibition is the largest to date by the Dutch artist Job Koelewijn. Inspired by the Henry Moore Institute building, he has brought together pieces which have until now only been seen in isolation. Much of his work is about ways of looking and seeing, and this installation aims to heighten our apprehension of the building as a sculpture in itself.

The exhibition juxtaposes four works that are part of the same ‘family’:

* Cinema on Wheels (1999), a walk-in sculpture situated outside the Institute in Victoria Gardens

* Kaleidoscope (2001, Van Abbe Museum in Eindhoven) in the first gallery

* Running Shadow (2002), in the main gallery – a monumental version of a work shown previously at the Stella Lohaus Gallery, Antwerp

* A new work in the last room that has been made specially for this exhibition and which creates a new ‘view’ within the Institute’s interior

Koelewijn’s work uses simple means in a monumental way. It is transparently obvious, but flirts with deception. It invites people in for a ‘continuous performance’ of something which they have already seen, but offers it in a new way, with a different viewfinder. Koelewijn cuts holes in the fabric of our perception; either literally, or by using mirrors to reflect our world back at us.

Try and see it your way follows on from Wonder, and falls within a series of exhibitions about sculpture and transformation. The medieval concept of ‘wonder’ – a combination of doubt with the desire to be convinced – is, in fact, remarkably close to the spirit of contemporary art as made so evident here. After training in Amsterdam, Job Koelewijn, (b.1962) took a PS1 Fellowship in New York, where he lived until 2000. In 1999 he represented the Netherlands at the Venice Biennale. A major catalogue of his work – published by Chisenhale/Tema Celeste – is currently in production.

IMAGE:
Job Koelewijn
Kaleidoscope 

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