Frank Ammerlaan

Born in The Netherlands in 1979, lives and works in Berlin

FA-2024-Guardians-overview FA-2024-Guardians-Guardian1 FA-2024-Guardians-overview FA-2024-Guardians-Guardian2 FA-2024-Guardians-Untitled-patchworks-overview FA-2024-Untitled-Lead-65x50 Untitled (Chemicals on Canvas) (2023) installed at group exhibition Mixed Feelings Untitled (Chemicals on Canvas) (2023) installed at group exhibition Mixed Feelings (Chemicals on Canvas) Untitled, Frank Ammerlaan (2022) Upstream Focus 2022 | Body Armor Untitled, (2022)
Dust, dirt, iron and iron oxide on linen and jute Untitled, 2020, meteorite particles, metal allow, iron, iron oxide, metal particles and pigments on linen,155 x 330 cm Exhibition: Body Armor, 2020, Upstream Gallery, 2020 Untitled (Body Armor Series), 2020, Lead, 96 x 78 x 7 Frank Ammerlaan
Untitled, 2020
dust, dirt, meteorite particles on linen and jute
130 x 280 cm Untitled (Body Armor Series), 2020, lead, 103 x 82 cm Untitled, 2020, dust, dirt, iron and iron oxide on jute, 130 x 110 cm Exhibition: Iron Mountain, SIM Galeria 2019, Sao Paulo Upstream Gallery: Private Viewing Space, 2020 'Untitled', 2018. Embroidery, dust, dirt on linen, jute, canvas,145 x 115 cm 'Untitled', 2018. Metal particles on linen, 145 x 115 cm. Photo: Gert Jan van Rooij 'Untitled', 2018. Dust, dirt, meteorite particles, embroidery on linen, canvas, jute, 145 x 115 cm. Photo: Gert Jan van Rooij Bienal de Curitiba, Song for my hands, Oscar Niemeyer Museum, Brazil 'Untitled', 2018. Metal, 85 x 70 x 50. Photo: Gert Jan van Rooij Exhibition: Particles of Dust, Upstream Gallery 2017. Photo: Gert Jan van Rooij Particles of Dust, 2017. Dust, dirt, meteorite particles, iron particles and iron powders on canvas, linnen and jute, 170 x 375 cm Exhibition: Particles of Dust, Upstream Gallery 2017. Photo: Gert Jan van Rooij Exhibition: Particles of Dust, Upstream Gallery 2017. Photo: Gert Jan van Rooij 'Hypocenter', 2017. Dust, dirt, meteorite particles on linnen, oxidized linnen, 150 x 170 cm. Photo: Gert Jan van Rooij 'Cosmic Imprint', 2017. Dust, dirt, meteorite particles on canvas and linen, 155 x 125 cm. Photo: Gert Jan van Rooij Exhibition view of 'Day's End' (2012). Photo by Gert Jan van Rooij.
Frank Ammerlaan
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Biography

At the core of Frank Ammerlaan’s practice lies desire to capture the constant flux of our reality that goes beyond individual lives and knowledges and equally pertains to eternal processes on the cosmic scale. This vision is cultivated by using unconventional materials ranging from dirt and dust to (liquid) metals, chemicals, and meteorite particles which give his practice their complex and nuanced structures, often made in collaboration with scientists and chemists. Ammerlaan can be seen as a contemporary alchemist, where his medium is researching perception, the boundaries of painting, and unpredictable processes. His medium is the world’s physical matter, excavated from the ground or fallen down from the sky.

‘I see my works as objects of measurement where materiality is a tool to describe the world. Matter is not an anonymous bystander, nor a passive agent, but rather a dynamic and evolutionary creature that transforms, mutates and deteriorates.’

Abridged version of dr Malgorzata Misniakiewicz’ essay ‘BODY ARMOR

Frank Ammerlaan (1979) is based in Berlin. He graduated from the Gerrit Rietveld Academie in Amsterdam in 2007 and in 2012 from his Masters at the Royal College of Art in London. Ammerlaan was awarded the Royal Award for Painting in 2012, which is handed to the most promising young Dutch painter of that year. Other prizes he won include the Scheffer Prize (2013), the Land Securities Prize Royal College of Art, the Doha Studio Art Prize (all 2012) and the Gerrit Rietveld Academy Painting Prize (2007). Ammerlaan has had solo exhibitions at the Dordrechts Museum, Museo d’Arte Conteporanea Calasetta and at several international galleries like Simões de Assis Art in Brazil. His work has been included in a number of group exhibitions in and outside of the Netherlands, at places such as White Cube Gallery London, Oscar Niemeyer Museum Brazil, The Royal Palace in Amsterdam KUMU Art Museum, in Tallinn, Museum Catharijneconvent in Utrecht, Kunsthal in Rotterdam and NEST in The Hague. Ammerlaan’s work is part of leading private and corporate art collections and museums such as Centraal Museum Utrecht, Kunstmuseum Den Haag, Museum Voorlinden and Stedelijk Museum Schiedam.

Artist's website

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Exhibitions

Guardians

11 May - 22 Jun '24

Mixed Feelings

1 Jul - 5 Aug '23

Upstream Focus: Frank Ammerlaan

17 Feb - 23 Feb '21

Art Rotterdam 2022

19 May - 22 May '22

ON THE ROAD at Lage Egal

19 Mar - 16 Apr '22

Upstream Focus: Frank Ammerlaan

17 Feb - 23 Feb '21

BODY ARMOR

24 Oct - 19 Dec '20

Upstream Focus

16 May - 22 May '20

Artissima Fondamenta

5 Jun - 5 Jul '20

Iron Mountain

30 Mar - 11 May '19

Out of Office

11 Dec '18 - 7 Apr '19

Wolvecampprijs 2018

30 Sep - 7 Oct '18

Shelter

1 Jul - 7 Sep '18

Avesso Viés

9 Jun - 21 Jul '18

SP-Arte

11 Apr - 15 Apr '18

Another Dimension

13 Jan - 18 Mar '18

Curitiba Biennal 2017

30 Sep '17 - 25 Feb '18

De Scheffer 2017

31 Oct '17 - 18 Apr '18

Song for my Hands, Curitiba Biennal '17

30 Sep '17 - 25 Feb '18

Particles of Dust

20 May - 8 Jul '17

Reset II, Priska Pasquer Gallery

3 Sep '16 - 27 Jan '17

MOONLESS

8 Apr - 27 May '16

TRANSFORMER

3 Oct - 14 Nov '15

Outside the Wireframe

28 Aug - 27 Nov '15

PIVO, Open Studio Residencies

29 Aug - 29 Aug '15

Reset I

5 Sep - 2 Nov '15

The Extended Arms of the Transom

22 May - 27 Jun '15

Faith by Proxy

24 Jan - 14 Mar '15

White Cube: 'Open Cube'

21 Jul - 21 Sep '16

Love Illumination

19 Oct - 23 Nov '13

NEST / Alchemy

6 Sep - 2 Nov '14

Armory Show 2013

7 Mar - 11 Mar '13

Reforming Intervals

22 Mar - 10 May '14

Soloshow / De Scheffer Prize 2013

29 Oct '13 - 12 Jan '14

Mapping the Horizon

19 Nov '11 - 7 Jan '12

A Decade Upstream

30 Nov - 19 Dec '13

Day's End

30 Nov '12 - 19 Jan '13

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