Heavy Satin II
at Espace Topic, Geneva
group show with Roman Gysin and Manon Wertenbroek
curated by Last Tango (Linda Jensen and Adrianna Gelini
19.11 - 14.12.2020
https://www.lasttango.info/topic
HING HETZ, 2020
Heavy Satin II revisits a former exhibition previously held in Spring 2020 at the Last Tango exhibition space in Zurich, curated by Linda Jensen and Arianna Gellini, presenting works by Lisa Biedlingsmaier, Roman Gysin, and Manon Wertenbroek. The artists’ practices challenge categorical divisions created between systems, such as decoration vs. fine arts, good taste vs. vulgarity, distance vs. proximity, and the clinical vs. the emotional. There is a noticeable presence of handiwork, performed with craftsmanship and care, in the sculptures and installations. Their tactile surfaces utilise such textures as satin, leather, canvas, rope, and metal. Heavy Satin II tests escapist strategies through which we access the sculptural body and its connections to fetish, to vulnerability, to the collective, and to self-care, doing so through objects whose sleekness alone could merit display. The title aims to conjure thoughts of an impending weight, subtly suggesting the aggression and machismo of heavy metal while also evoking the voluptuous feminine sensuality of satin.
Heavy Satin II is presented at the TOPIC exhibition space in Geneva and is visible from the street thanks to a glass wall. On view in what has been converted into a window display, the installation is enclosed while also completely visible to the public from the outside. This particularity allows the show to continue to be seen during this period of partial lockdown, during which all exhibition venues must remain closed between the 2nd and 29th of November 2020. This closure is by necessity and ordered by Genevan authorities to combat the second wave of Covid-19. The exhibition and the spatial specificity of TOPIC explore the dynamic between long and close-up views, the desire to touch, and the capacity for self-reflective analysis through art, while some of the artworks presented evoke fairy-tale settings, contexts of fragility, and objects as bearers of energy.