ART-PRESENTATION: Luizia Simons-Out of the Blue

Luzia Simons, Stockage 134, 2010, Galerie Mikael Andersen ArchiveUsing scanning techniques, Luzia Simons produces images of flowers. In this way, her images not only come to include the ideal forms of blossoming beauty, but also faults, malfunctions and the start of irrevocable decay. Simons’ work, however, is not primarily concerned with the warning of vanitas but with the rather rambling tale of a cultural symbol. The tulip thus becomes a metaphor of mobility, globalisation and intercultural identity.

By Efi Michalarou
Photo: Galerie Mikael Andersen

Luzia Simons presents new photo and video works, in her exhibition “Out of the Blue” at the Galerie Mikael Andersen in Copenhagen. The title of the exhibition refers to the colour that is not present in any of the works. The green and red nuances of the plants and the deep black of the backgrounds dominate while the blue, in spite of its absence, functions as an ever present possibility within the works. The unpredictable and the transformation are also at the centre of Simons’ video works where the exotic blooms comes mysteriously to life through the film. The works have a very clear connection to the Flemish still life paintings and are filled with the vanitas* symbolism as well as the scientific herbaria of the 18th Century. With an underlying remark on the speed with which we destroy nature as a fundamental theme for our epoch, Luzia Simons’ works also have a strong critical and social element, and these themes intersect in her works. The political and aesthetic elements are inseparable from one another; references to art history are as explicit as those to economic and commercial conditions and also cultural exchange. The exhibition also plays on the contrast between the art historical remnants in the works and the very new, digital techniques that are used to execute them.

*Vanitas is a category of symbolic works of art, especially those associated with the still life paintings of the 16th and 17th Centuries in Flanders and the Netherlands.

Info: Galerie Mikael Andersen, Bredgade 63, Copenhagen, Duration: 19/8-24/9/16, Days & Hours: Tue-Fri 12:00-18:00, Sat 11:00-15:00, www.mikaelandersen.com

Luzia Simons, Jardim 4, 2014, Galerie Mikael Andersen Archive
Luzia Simons, Jardim 4, 2014, Galerie Mikael Andersen Archive

 

 

Luzia Simons, Stockage 83, 2010, Galerie Mikael Andersen Archive
Luzia Simons, Stockage 83, 2010, Galerie Mikael Andersen Archive