M HKA Ensembles

Installation

Collection: Collection M HKA, Antwerp (Inv. no. BK6174_M138).

The works of Goele de Bruyn, like the raincoats, seem at first sight to be an attempt to reconstruct everyday things, a reconstruction executed with the greatest of care in all manner of house-, garden- and kitchen material Goele de Bruyn collects just about all she comes across. With these materials she makes works that are often inspired by the world of the child. Initially the little jackets look like amusing child-handicrafts, but going on as well is a nostalgic and ironic wink to the oftimes too serious, established world of contemporary art. Nuance, ambiguity and good-natured humor come together.

The artist herself puts it like this: "I begin by taking apparent oppositions, both as to form and content, and try to reconcile them. The everyday becomes strange and threatening; menace becomes something normal. I start with an aesthetic given which, in its elaboration, acquires a certain acerbity or kitschiness, whereby it's knocked a bit off balance, becomes uncertain and thus touching. Or I combine the sculpture with an unexpected element that really doesn't fit, and so disrupts the calm and the aesthetic. Each work must propose a new problem, so that the method doesn't gain the upper hand." 

The raincoats that are intended to protect, are made of garbage bags. Through its simplicity, the piece possesses a certain modesty. At the same time, the assembly of different materials and the play with oppositions and proportions, evoke other possible associations and new meanings. The work remains a puzzle, a form of seduction.