ANDREA
WAGNER
... AND THE ARCHITECT IS STILL FACING HIS JARDIN INTÉRIEUR
NOVEMBER 27 - DECEMBER 23, 2014
The first
time I met Andrea Wagner was about ten years ago in a muddy field in
the Netherlands, where we worked with cows as a theme and the mud and
manure as the material. Was it already there she began her series "The
Architect Who Faced His Jardin Intérieur"? After that meeting,
we showed Andrea Wagner's jewellery which she then described as a passion
in working experimentally with materials and giving them her own mark.
She considered this vital in order to create the intriguing appearance
and surfaces necessary for the tactile materiality to communicate the
stories or thoughts behind her work. She started to work with bone china
porcelain which consists of ca. 40% cow bone ash.
Andrea
Wagner from Amsterdam is now warmly welcomed again, this time to her
first solo exhibition at PLATINA. In the exhibition we will see blown
up sketches and her ongoing body of work that has been followed up by
a whole new group of pieces. This time with the sub-title: "...
And the Architect Is Still Facing His Jardin Intérieur".
-
Sofia Björkman, PLATINA 2014
... And the Architect Is Still Facing His Jardin Intérieur
"Jardin
interieur": French for the private landscape - inner garden - of
our mind.
This series is about architectural forms intermeshing with nature.
The idea of blurring the separation point of what is essentially regarded
as architecture and what nature also stands in as playful metaphor for
facing up to secret dreams - of taking them out of their compartmentalization
into separate areas and life´s time frames and weaving them into
reality. Step out of seemingly unrisky choices and embrace a dream that
at first seems unlikely!
This series begun after far too much house hopping and embodies the
exuberant joyfulness of my at last getting my dream home. It ended an
obsessive yearning for stability whilst living in instability.
Being a frequent traveller, I am quite familiar with that exciting tension
of leaving the familiar stability and safe haven of home to surrendering
to the insecurity of what is new whilst discovering new impressions
on the way. When returning to the familiar it is with a head full of
fresh perceptions that only sharpens my connection to the intimate sheltering
space of home and viewing things from a new vantage. This is my connection
to an intimate and safe space where all kinds of contradictions can
naturally exist side by side and within each other.
Little surprise that so much inspiration for this body of work comes
from places I´ve visited or want to go to.
The diversity of materials and forms in this series are like the layered
impressions of an extended travel log.
Very recently the work on some new pieces has taken me into beach and
other water landscapes. I myself am as little a gardener as I am a beach
holiday lover, and the deeper aspect of that very recent work with more
translucent glass elements as yet still eludes me...
-
Andrea Wagner 2014
Andrea
Wagner was born in Germany, grew up in Canada and lives since 1994 in
Amsterdam. She studied at the Gerrit Rietveld Academy Amsterdam from
where she graduated 1997. Since then her working base is in her own
studio in Amsterdam but she's a frequent traveller and exhibits, curates
and works around the globe.