07 Apr 2011

Cultuurcentrum Strombeek Grimbergen presents 3x Jan Dibbets (bkSM #11)

The Dutch artist Jan Dibbets (1941) is one of the most influential artists of our time. He will be celebrating his 70th birthday this year and bkSM (beeldende kunst Strombeek/Mechelen) is taking advantage of this opportunity to pull out all the stops and exhibit his incredible impressive work with a great deal of pride.

As early as the late nineteen sixties, Jan Dibbets created work which tended to lean towards the Italian Arte Povera; Works with bundles of twigs, grass, and neon were the expressive result. With the British artist Richard Long, he shares an early friendship as well as the passion of working with distances, registering intervals in time and space, gradually transferring his work to photography. Without light there is no image, no photos.

Well�thought out and structured working methods, such as interval settings of shutter times and pre�programmed diafragma settings, enabled Jan Dibbets to visualise time via photography. A work such as Het invallend licht in een ruimte van het Van Abbemuseum gefotografeerd op de kortste dag (The Shortest Day at the Van Abbemuseum)(1970) shows a patchwork of 80 photos mounted next to one another, each taken with identical time differences which 'together' document the incoming light of the shortest day in the famous museum. It is just one of the many masterpieces which will be on display at the '3x Dibbets' expo!

Jan Dibbets improved the a priori distortion in the reproduction of perspective in the photographic representation and then corrected the 'thing' to be photographed to the extent that it, for example, could be reproduced as a perfect square in the photo. The illusion of a photo!

Jan Dibbets worked on a master oeuvre born from a desire to experiment, the need for order, and an intense interest for the Dutch art of painting in which the 'horizontal' of land and sea dominates against disjointed (interior) architecture.

The concise observation of the environment is central; even reflections on the glistening bodywork of cars did not escape him when registering light reflections in colour. In later work, time and labour consuming monochrome paintings became the framework for photos with an 'outdoor' view; glass windows in churches, with the same intense love for light and colour, were transformed into timeless and permanently (in appearance) altering 'structures'.

Jan Dibbets's oeuvre stems from an inquisitive, poetic intelligence which grasps the viewer with a visual sharpness, attention being thus compelled to the light that literally takes 'form' and becomes legible in his works.

In the beautiful exhibition halls of cultuurcentrum Mechelen, a wide overview of the earlier, consequently historical work of Jan Dibbets is on offer.

In cultuurcentrum Strombeek, emphasis is placed on the horizon; the magical, intangible line between land and sky and between land and sea. Jan Dibbets creates a completely new type of architecture in Strombeek.

In the White�Out studio in Knokke, attention is focused on Jan Dibbets's early print work; scores of brilliant prints in which the visual pleasure of the art of instruction lies in line with what we know under the name 'conceptual art'.

'Jan Dibbets 3X' is a unique, must�see exhibition of size and importance interspersed with a number of contextual activities as well as the publication of a bkSM copybook containing two new essays by Sven Beckstette (Editor in Chief of Texte zur Kunst, Berlin) and Yves Aupetitallot (Director 'Magasin', Grenoble); with photos from photographer Kristien Daem.


Preview in the exhibition halls of Cultuurcentrum Mechelen on Thursday 14 April from 7 p.m. to 9:30 p.m.
Introduction: Mr Jos Van Rillaer – Administrator General Arts & Heritage, Flemish Community
14.04.2011 � 05.06.2011
Tentoonstellingszalen (Exhibition halls) Mechelen, Minderbroedersgang 5, 2800 Mechelen
T. 015 29 40 00 – www.cultuurcentrummechelen.be – cultuurcentrum@mechelen.be
open: Thursday�Sunday, 11 a.m. – 6 p.m.

Preview in Cultuurcentrum Strombeek on Friday 15 April from 7 p.m.
Introduction: Mr Lodewijk De Witte � Provincial Governor of Flemish Brabant
15.04.2011 � 15.05.2011
Cultuurcentrum (cultural centre) Strombeek, Gemeenteplein, 1853 Strombeek�Bever
T. 02 263 03 43 – www.ccstrombeek.be – info@ccstrombeek.be
open: daily, 9 a.m. – 10 p.m.

Preview in White�Out Studio in Knokke�Heist on Saturday 16 April from 4 p.m. to 7 p.m.
Talk with Seth Siegelaub at 7 p.m.!
16.04.2011 � 05.06.2011
White�Out Studio Knokke�Heist, Van Bunnenlaan 58A, 8300 Knokke�Heist
T. 050 62 93 63 – www.whiteoutstudio.be – info@whiteoutstudio.be
open: Wednesday�Sunday, 2 p.m. – 6 p.m.

This project can be visited completely free of charge!