exhibition
08/02/2018 — 11/02/2018
Deli square
CBK R'DAM MAKES POSSIBLE: Photo talent at Rotterdam PHOTO
While Art Rotterdam Week The Rotterdam Photo Festival will also take place on Deliplein, the central square on Katendrecht within walking distance of the Nederlands Fotomuseum. The festival showcases work by photographers with diverse practices and includes installations, video works and analogue work. CBK Rotterdam is present at Rotterdam PHOTO with the exhibition FAKE | TRUTH and selected work by Annette Kisling, Sandim Mendes and Naomi Modde: artists with a strong connection to Rotterdam.
Annette Kisling is a photographer and lives in Berlin and Leipzig. In series of photographs she describes her experiences with the architecture that surrounds her. Her focus is, among other things, on the modernist architecture of the 20th century. In 2002 and 2003, Kisling spent a year in Rotterdam as an artist-in-residence. She came across a rich and lively city. During her working period, several photo series were created that portray different areas within Rotterdam. Years later, in 2017, Annette Kisling returns to Rotterdam. The city had changed a lot in the meantime. These changes become visible in the presentation of Kisling at Rotterdam PHOTO.
Investigates in her photographic work Sandim Mendes the concept of identity in and between cultures. Her work focuses on strong social aspects while drawing inspiration from her immediate environment and living conditions. Mendes recently showed her work in a new installation in TENT in which she reconstructed the stories with which her grandfather passed on stories as a storyteller and provided the future with a life elsewhere.
Mendes: “In this series of works I play with the idea of a fictional reality. I show something that can be accepted as something real, but is that also true? For example in the self-portrait series. As a maker, I use myself as a model in these series (except Masq en Untitled= color photo), x on x in a different guise / clothing / gender. Which hopefully raises questions about exactly what identity is, especially looking at culture, gender and stereotyping it. And lastly, for me photography and its evidential value and archival properties play the most important role in creating this fictional reality. ”
Naomi Modde goes in her photographic work in search of the connection between people. To what extent do we feel connected or are we alienated from each other? What connects us or creates a distance? In our neighborhood, our city, our country and in the world. In different series, this theme comes up in various ways. In Modde's most recent project, De Bootbewoners, she investigated during the OFF-Blaak project to what extent the residents of the houseboats in the city triangle of Rotterdam feel 'neighbors' with the people in the new residential towers. During Rotterdam Photo, Modde shows her analogue photo series Zeevlam.
Modde: “As a photographer, I value the sincerity of images. With the documentary slant my work has, I focus on the 'real person'. Who we are in all our purity. As I find someone in the moment, I also want to capture that person and convey it to the audience. Working with film gives me the opportunity to get close to my subject without losing the moment. You often scare people off if you want to approach them with a large lens. They shoot out of their natural position and begin to pose. With rolls of film, the people I portray are less intimidated in my perception, which means that a dialogue on an equal level is faster.
Suddenly we are no longer complete strangers on the beach, but they slowly show themselves and welcome me into their lives for a fraction of a second. ”