Michiel Jansen -
Construct and separate.

The exhibition Construct and separate presents the works of Dutch artist Michiel Jansen. Interested in industrial mediums, surfaces and patters he approaches the concept of space by analysing how architecture, materials and functionality interact. Michiel`s works reveal a fascination for building techniques as well as a deep connection with previous traditions, such as conceptualism, minimalism and Arte povera.

Jansen`s works are often site specific: the artist creates an artwork that actively communicates with the environment after he has seen, felt and perceived the environment himself. The intuitive process starts either with a personal reference or with a formal interest in some characteristics of the space. City Harbour exemplifies the first case. The title, in fact, reveals a connection with the home city of the artist: Rotterdam. Two main aspects of this city stand out in Jansen`s sculpture: the black pillars recall the docks of Rotterdam which is the largest port in Europe and has been the largest port of the world for a long time; secondly, the complex vertical sculpture that stands on one of the pillars refers to the continuous construction of buildings that rapidly change the skyline of the city.

In this and other sculptures different materials, shapes and surfaces stimulate the feeling of touch that participates in a new definition of space: where is the border between the structure and the empty space that surrounds it? How is each material relating to it? The more or less rough industrial materials are a crucial element in Jansen`s work. Styrofoam, mdf, floor insolation and chipboard are common and familiar materials that are used in an unconventional way to create sculptures and three dimensional tiles. Surprising the viewer with atypical shapes, Jansen aims to introduce a new perspective on the world by neglecting the functionality of the materials. The artist longs to reintroduce the original value of these materials denying the use that the consumer society made them for, hence by using them as the Italian movement Arte povera used to.

The big shapes that Jansen builds by superimposing different types of materials, by laying them on the floor or hanging them on the wall create a tension with the surrounding space. In his works Jansen demonstrates an interest not only in the occupied space but also in emptiness thus revealing an appreciation for Minimalism and one of its best representatives, Sol Le Witt. This is the last time I explain how it is done, for instance, is built around a structure of four steel bars that define a volume partially occupied by a milky glass in the middle. The rest of the space between the bars is empty yet it is perceived as part of the artwork.

Jansen plays with the boundaries and limits of space by constructing, separating, gluing, applying and combining materials which are used out of their usual context. By creating a sort of construction site in an art gallery, Jansen makes a statement: everything can be seen from a different perspective. To show what things really are, to perceive materials in their original form implies a change of angle which is conceived as a sort of revelation. The artworks remove the veil and show that things can be given a different meaning than the one has conventionally been given to them.

TM51 Window Gallery (Fridtjof Nansens plass 6) og TM51 Infill (Parkveien 5)

Exhibition opening January 30th. 2020 at 18.00, Fridtjof Nansens plass 6