The new soloshow of Marc Bijl at Upstream Gallery will be the last show where dark symbolism will meet up with abstract forms. After this it will be codes only. It is the moment before total paranoia and abstraction of the artists work.
Every structural political or religious system is a system of power, sustainability and belief and not of wisdom, change and development. This show connects the artists thoughts on those structures and where he belongs himself as an artist in an arthistorical context.
Some previous works were adressing already the spiritual minimalism and abstract questions referring to Barnett Newman, Piet Mondrian and SoLewitt. They were searching for the same exit strategy, away from religious freedom and political choices into fundamentalistic thoughts and radical art.
This exhibition will show the missing link between that spirit and Marc Bijl’s own personal background of goth music, political interest and grafitti-art. Departing from the 9/11 WTC attacks and their ever lasting debates and conspiracy theories as a backdrop for the human ability to turn every disastrous event into an abstract idea of good and evil. Old vs New. The cliché images we might know from existing theories and arthistory into personal works of art of conspiracy between paintings, video and sculpture.

Upstream Cinema

New video-works by;

David Haines

Jeroen Jongeleen

Christóbal León

Jen Liu

Christóbal León (in collaboration with Nina Wehrle) – videostill from ‘Der Kleinere Raum’

For his first solo show at Upstream Gallery, Zwartjes has build a
monumental installation which best can be characterized as environmental,
the podia on which episodes of a narrative take place. This new
installation is constructed from damaged, half decayed materials and
objects that Zwartjes collected during his journeys through the city.

Together with a number of life-size figures, the found materials make up
the decor for a mythological journey of self-destruction to rebirth in an
apocalyptic tableau.

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detail of a maquette ‘Untitled’ 2006.