Jean Bernard Koeman (1964) is a visual artist and exhibition maker. Koeman’s installations represent a mental architecture. They are edifices with human – or cognisant – features. They radiate feelings and thoughts in essay-like arrangements, woven together into a materialised diagram of moments or conflicts from the history of art and architecture. The installations appear to be monumental models of structures that are impossible to realise.
The positioning and presentation of the installations and works are key factors. They are related to the space surrounding them within the confines of a course. Shapes, materials, architectural echoes, motifs, and mutual connections coalesce into an experience space.
Visitors are confronted with grand sculptural expressions featuring all sorts of details. They go on an associative walk as size, shape and meaning are generated and mingled together, and an unexpected poetry emerges. It’s a quest for intertextual qualities in a non-linear story.
The main principles underpinning the three-dimensional work are architecture, language, socio-political or landscape history, and the use of materials that Koeman believes harbour some kind of meaning. He acts out this meaning in a different, formal context. This results in installations that exist as sampled or layered modules zooming in on and away from details through drawings, text, and photoprints.
At Club Solo, Koeman is presenting new and older works that can almost be read like unfolded stories.
open wed – sun 11:00 – 17:00
official opening 5 Sept 15.00
review Metropolis M (Dutch) please click here