Check it out! The talented people of Rotterdam Photo Festival made this short documentary about my work. Don’t forget to check out Rotterdamphoto.eu for festival dates and more inspiring photographers, documentaries and events!
Thanks to: Rotterdam Photo Festival, Julia Gat, Yeltsiny Stroop and Marcel Kollen!
Suns are photosculptures made by Marieke Matthijs.
Marieke has created several different art series using this technique. She created the more than 90 round photosculptures for the series “Suns”.
Photography is a well-established form of art, but lacks a textured depth. In these times of digital photography where photos often don’t leave screens. There is a lack of real physical connection between between people and photographs. We all experience the obvious advantages of digital photography. It has also made photography fleeting and people less sensitive to photo prints. Marieke wants to renew a physical relationship between people and photographs, in the hope digitisation is not the end- station of the connection people have with physical photo prints.
“I started treating photo prints with hot oil. Ordinarily speaking, I deep- fry photo prints in order to elevate a fleeting image into a work of art.”
Manipulating photos with hot oil has been a focus point for several years. A lot of factors come into play like photo development techniques, temperatures and the type of photographic paper. Every factor results in different outcomes. Marieke Matthijs spent years researching the surprising components of the hot oil treatment.
“This necklace was my grandmothers favourite and now it lays untouched in my drawer”. Marieke Matthijs new art project is about objects that come with emotions when inherited. Often we cherish the objects because of the memories and even if we don’t use them we dedicate a space in our homes to them. I created photographs and salt sculptures using inherited necklaces to emphasise their unused state.
Exhibited at: Uit het Gareel Festival, The grey space in the middle Den Haag, May 2022.
The Covid-19 lockdown was a struggle for many. People were limited to their homes and often had to cook with the ingredients that were available in the kitchen cabinets. Fear of the virus created a challenge in the kitchen and in life at home. But every challenge also has a positive side.
I found myself battling with feelings of depression during the lockdown. My bed was a favoured spot and food turned out to be a comfort in more ways than one. Although it did not always meet my ‘’huidhonger” (a Dutch word that emerged during the lockdown, describing a new phenomenon: the hunger of human contact), the warmth of my bed occasionally helped me cope with the lack of physical contact outside my immediate family. Preparing and consuming food helped me to fill my agenda in a time when outside activities were minimised.
Being deprived of access to my studio, I decided to turn my kitchen at home into a workspace. I started experimenting with creating textures resembling textile with only edible ingredients and tools available in het kitchen. I photographed the textures to depict the sheets on my bed during the lockdown period from March until June 2020.
After the summer of 2020, in which we enjoyed a relaxation of the pandemic measures, I feel an anxiety for a similar lockdown surfacing. Will reality adjust itself again?
