First Impressions, LeoXIII, Tilburg 2023
Organised by Jamie Kane & Mila Lanfermeijer
With works by Jacob Dwyer, Halla Einarsdóttir, Jakob Forster, Helen Frik, Alex Storey Gordon, Hans Hovy, Jamie Kane, Bernd Krauss, Mila Lanfermeijer & Kirit Chitara, Rhett Leinster, Anna Luczak, Ana Navas, Micha Patiniott, Josie Perry, Petter Dahlström Persson, Daphne Simons, Jesse Strikwerda, Riette Wanders & Lorenza Wistuba.
Images: Franz Müller-Schmidt
Text by Mila Lanfermeijer
"They could not guess where he slept at night, though they searched for a depression on the couch or a disorder among the towels. He left no smell behind him. He did not bleed, he did not cry, he did not sweat. He was dry. Even his urine divorced itself from his penis and entered the toilet almost before it had left him, like a bullet from a gun."
In her short story "The Brother-in-Law", Lydia Davis writes of a ghostly house guest that moves like a shadow, sliding around the doorframe, slipping over the sill. At night he creeps around the kitchen, shaving off slivers of meat, of nuts, of bread, until his plate, paper-thin, feels heavy to him.
The man in Davis’ story is described through his lightness of presence, making himself so small, no more than a sort of vapour. His fate ends by being accidentally shaken out of the mattress, brushed over the floor and wiped off the windowpane. Davis’ story imprints an image of her character onto a reader through rendering what is not there. The Brother-in-law curiously appears through his absence.
This exhibition started with a welcome invitation to a group of artists we feel close to and whose work we feel a great affinity with. We received costumes for absent sculptures, voluptuous stone carvings, a well meaning felted flasher, the story of an unseen character in a New Orleans swamp, the history of a nun with a self healing jaw. Traces, imprints and impressions started to draw the outlines of bodies and characters.
The works of twenty-one artists have now landed and settled in the studio, kitchen, bedroom and living room of the former Gastatelier Leo XIII. We hope to welcome you on the 11th of November.