The exhibition Kanon at Antikmuseet (The Museum of Ancient Art) by the artists Marie Retpen and Kristine Hellesøe is a sensual study of the body.
Oct- Dec. 2023.
The exhibition is supported by the Statens Kunstfond. (Danish Arts Foundation)
Through the properties of different materials, the body’s form and formlessness, greatness and decay are pointed out. Silicone, glass, paper, plaster. Large shadows, random shapes, traces of something and concrete material. As with the body, the materials can only be partially controlled. When paper is placed in water and curled glass vessels, when silicone imitates, when body parts are cast in plaster, coincidences arise.
The French philosopher Georg Batailles dealt with t L’Informe – The formless. We want to create order and systematize, but when we try to systematize everything, such as with a reference work, there will always be something we forget, a remnant, something that didn’t make it. The formless is an elusive concept, and
Batailles never defines it. But he points out that there is something we overlook, when we try to define everything – all that, which we apparently cannot use for anything or are not aware of. The body is more than an ideal shape. It is also a map of a life lived which bears witness to constant transformation.
In antiquity working out was the way to get a perfect body. Today, only science, technology and perhaps ethics set limits on how to manipulate the body and fight against its natural transience.
