Art Antwerp 2025

During Art Antwerp 2025, Upstream Gallery presents a duo exhibition of Kévin Bray (FR, 1989) and Jen Liu (USA, 1976).

Both artists employ a visual language rooted in Surrealism, while remaining strongly connected to the present. Working with diverse materials and in a collage-like manner, they both use fragmented bodies and cartoonish elements, heavily influenced by digital image culture. Beneath this playful surface, Bray and Liu probe the darker sides of digitalisation’s impact on human beings, the body, and society.

Kévin Bray’s hybrid, 3D-printed sculptures are physical manifestations of digitally created figures that regularly appear in his videos or paintings. To these physical sculptures, he adds found objects and paint, giving each work authentic qualities and turning it into a unique object. These figures thus travel through both digital and physical environments, recalling the interconnected and complementary processes they embody. The sculptures demonstrate that digital and physical layers form part of the same reality, constantly in dialogue with one another—both in Bray’s work and in society at large, where social media and algorithms profoundly shape our “physical” lives.

Jen Liu’s works on paper from the Electropore series shimmer in gold and pink. Body parts and objects emerge from cartoonish holes: graphic designs of severed fingers pressing buttons, female figures entangled in cords. Although lighthearted at first glance, the works speak of entrapment within closed structures and allude to the people hidden behind the glossy surface of new technologies. In her practice, Liu focuses on the often-invisible labour of female factory workers in the Global South. In Electropore, she shows how bodies become ensnared in systems of repetitive labour and minimal autonomy. In doing so, Liu makes visible how exploitation and production intertwine, and how the worker herself becomes part of a capitalist machine.

 

Upstream Gallery's booth at Art Antwerp will be supported by Mondriaan Fund.

 

Images:

Photos by Gert Jan van Rooij.

1. Kévin Bray, Sirens Want Peace, 2025, 3D printed PLA, glass, metal, second life objects, 61 x 45 x 34 cm

2. Jen Liu, Labor Cloud, 2022, Gesso, acrylic ink, acrylic gouache, and handmade acrylic metallic paint on paper, 178 x 130,5 cm