Sensory Spaces 3 – Elad Lassry
until 1 June 2014
Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen
Museumpark 18-20
NL-3015 CX Rotterdam
The Netherlands
Hours: Tuesday–Sunday 11am–5pm
Sensory Spaces is a series of commissioned solo exhibitions of work by leading international artists—unusual site-specific artworks and installations that subvert or sharpen the visitor’s experience and perception of a particular space. Where the exhibition space is often regarded as an unchangeable entity, functioning as a white cube, Sensory Spaces asks the artists to start from the features of the space itself. The specific character of the Willem van der Vorm Gallery, a long, high space open on its two short sides and open free of charge to every visitor, is the spatial context within which each artist is invited to develop a work.
Elad Lassry, born in Tel Aviv in 1977, and now living and working in Los Angeles, is creating an installation for the third Sensory Spaces. This is the first time a Dutch museum has featured his work. Elad Lassry focuses on the workings of the photographic image, both on a two-dimensional plane and in three-dimensional space. ‘Pictures,’ says Lassry, ‘are so very like what we see, and so very unlike what we see.’ He strips the photographic image down and plays with the individual elements that make up each shot—focus, depth, color, and scale. Recognizable images and the meanings we ascribe to them are called into question.
Many of Lassry’s photographs also contain formal elements. As well as geometric cut-outs, he places rectangular elements that resemble plinths in his photographs. Lassry recently started showing framed photographs with colorful silk ‘covers,’ which, like the geometric forms on the photograph, partially obscure the image. The geometric sculptures in Lassry’s installations serve the same function as these frames, shapes and covers.
This game of abstraction extends to their presentation. His photographs are framed in wooden frames, often painted with brightly colored gloss paint that corresponds to the main color in the photograph. The frame adds an abstract element to the work. The accompanying label explicitly includes the frame as part of the artwork, thus transforming the framed photographs into spatial objects consisting of a photograph and a frame. The geometric shapes and silk covers reinforce the notion that these are not simply framed photographs or collages, but three-dimensional objects.
Perception is also central to Lassry’s installation for Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen. The three freestanding sculptures are both decorative and functional. They function both as barriers to perception and as ‘viewing stations.’ As we move through the space we discover how the sculptures influence our perception of the photographic objects on the walls. Our eyes and movements are directed through the installation as a dancer’s movements are dictated by the choreography.
An essay by the curator accompanies each Sensory Spaces exhibition.
The Sensory Spaces series
Sensory Spaces 4 – Liu Wei 14 June–28 September
Sensory Spaces 3 – Elad Lassry until 1 June
Sensory Spaces 2 – Sabine Hornig
Sensory Spaces 1 – Oscar Tuazon
For more information, please contact the Marketing and Communications Department:
T +31 (0) 10 441 9561 / pressoffice [at] boijmans.nl
