Art Rotterdam / Intersections

Van Nellefabriek
Van Nelleweg 1
3044BC Rotterdam

JONAS LOCHT / MICHAEL VAN DEN ABEELE

Let’s be clear about it: Casino Science Fiction is not a pre- or post-apocalyptic celebration. The exhibition rather situates ‘science’ or knowledge between the casino, the little house for gambling, and fiction. As if science was an inversed space opera with the work Smog Machine by Jonas Locht (in stead of a smoking volcano) and a fictional constellation of meteorites painted on jeans by Michael Van den Abeele. Both works have the leading roles in what one could consider as two different ways of constructing an image. In this exhibition these objects meet and that’s about it. There might be two options: use an image of the space for clothing (as protection of the body that is too exposed, that has been suddenly forgotten); or send poisoned air back into the exhibition space where it doesn’t come from.  On the invitational level, the fear of time, sent out in space, could be called spaced, even is here accompanied by bricks and walls. The bricks and walls hit home on an illusional level – believe it (or not) - like there has to be remembered somewhere over there that architecture just is there to serve the protection of bodies, minds and objects. Nothing more, nothing less. Casino Science Fiction focuses on the importance of an illusion, as a specific kind of manipulation that one cannot always escape. It is the only thing that protects oneself from the implosive sucking of the hole in the real. There is no truth if one takes illusion for granted and situates the image afterwards as just a lie (What an anger!). She or he cannot let go (and there it goes). She or he can let go (look, it’s coming back). Comfort and pleasure are two different things. Comfort is pleasurable. Pleasure doesn’t comfort. The rest is (not) your business.

(Sofie Van Loo)

Jonas Locht, Michael Van Den Abeele, Bricks on Bricks, Preview, 2015, digital collage.

Crédit Photo: Ilse Raps