Breese Little, Londono
19.09.2014 - 25.10.2014
Jan Kempenaers: Enjoy the Process is a substantial mid‐career survey of Jan Kempenaers’ new and recent work. BREESE LITTLE will present a focus on the Antwerp‐based artist’s output across the ground floor gallery, introducing the breadth of Kempenaers’ work beyond his most renowned images. This will include a number of photographic series and individual images largely unseen in this country, accompanied by Kempenaers’ recent experiments with screen‐printing and a full display of the artist’s books.
Kempenaers’ photographic body of work is highly considered and meticulously compiled. Most series are restricted to a few carefully chosen shots of striking compositions. A glimpse of the artist’s website shows this archiving procedure, which shaves down any surplus imagery in favour of crucially representative images. The photographer presents a spectacle of cities and nature linked by understatement. Unusual vantage points and vistas are achieved without the crutch of Photoshop, resulting in a characteristic purism. S.F. – L.A. (2010), on display for the first time in the UK at BREESE LITTLE, documents a road trip down the West Coast of America, privileging plants, trees and cacti along the route, whether in the desert or the central reservation of a highway.
© Jan Kempenaers, Spomenik #17 (Kolašin), 2009
Kempenaers is best known for the stark photographs of his Spomenik series, iconic images charting World War Two memorials commissioned by General Tito in the 1960s and ‘70s in the former Yugoslavia. Crucial to his career and recent development, a number of Spomeniks will feature in the exhibition, focusing on those that are not much exhibited in this country. The Spomeniks will be exhibited alongside new works entitled Ghost Spomeniks, monochrome re‐workings of Kempenaers’ original views of the monuments.
© Jan Kempenaers, Spomenik #4 (Tjentište), 2007
Screen‐printing was likewise the focus of a 2014 residency at Frans Masereel Centrum, Belgium, a departure from Kempenaers’ signature approach of rigorous structure into unusually free form images, initially inspired by a similar foray into abstract photography by Lázló Moholy‐Nagy (1895 ‐ 1946). Alongside his affiliation with KASK/School of Arts Ghent, Kempenaers collaborates on site‐specific social art integration projects and artist workshops. A recent initiative resulted in the artist book Satellite Building: Kasper Andreasen & Jan Kempenaers, which will be on display during Enjoy the Process, alongside Kempenaers’ photographic books with Roma Publications.